Dreamland
by Liz Hollow
Summary: All hell had broken loose. I wished that we were not forced to choose sides, and I could stay with my best friend. But no one should ever live in a dreamland. It was just a little too much to ask. RoseScorpius.
1. My Wish

**Chapter One – My Wish**

All hell had broken loose. It was now that I wished everything was the way it had been for the past seventeen years of my life: simple and safe. Hogwarts had become my second home, and I wished for it to stay that way for the remainder of my final year here. I wished that the Slytherins and the Gryffindors would still get along, and that nothing could separate the school. I wished that there were not rumors spreading around the school as to who was going to become this and who was going to become that. There were so many things that I wished that it was scary to think about them. I just wished that Hogwarts was the way it had been before hell had erupted. It was a little too much to ask.

I wished that my family would not be so hectic right now, and my younger cousin and brother would not be scared. They seemed to be afraid of the other students, although it seemed immature for their ages of fifteen. They stayed close to each other and their large circle of friends, who all seemed to be from Gryffindor. It made me worry, and for once in my life, I really was scared of the future and how this would all turn out. The school was breaking, and teachers were always talking. It was my job, and the Head Boy's job, to protect the students—to get them through this horrid time. It seemed to me that Albus and I were never going to be able to help the students, when we could barely help ourselves.

I had friends in other houses. Not all of my friends were from Gryffindor. It pained me to think that I would have to be separated from them. But most of all, I was scared to lose my best friend, who just happened to be in Slytherin. It was not fair to not allow friends to be friends. My parents were practically spying on me to see if I was hanging around with him, even though they only recommended that I not go near him ever again. You cannot separate friends; it just is not right. I wished we were not forced to choose sides, and I could stay with my best friend. A Gryffindor and a Slytherin could never be on the same side, however much I wanted to be on his, or he on mine.

I was perhaps the first to find out about all of this. My parents had sent me a letter, describing the events that had happened outside of school. I told my cousins, whose parents had later sent messages as well. We told no one else—the Aurors and Ministry would handle the events outside of school. It was not our problem, nor did we need to worry about it. It would only make us scared if we had to deal with it. Let the professionals handle it. Although, I worried for a while about my own letter. They had sent a separate one to Hugo, my brother. My parents had simply told him not to mess around with the wrong people, which he needed not to worry about. Mine frightened me, though.

_Dear Rose,_

_You should not be afraid of what we are about to tell you, but please know that it is a completely serious matter. We know that you will handle the situation with entire sincerity and caution, which is what we expect of you. But please do not tell the whole entire school of this. We would rather have their own parents, or the teachers, perhaps, inform them than the Head Girl. I am sure their parents would rather have it that way. Your father and I know that you will do what is right, so we should have no problem telling you all of this._

_Events have been occurring here at home that no one ever expected. You know that Uncle Harry defeated Lord Voldemort nearly twenty-six years ago, and his followers were either sent to Azkaban or killed, depending on their crimes. Most of the Death Eaters that were sent to Azkaban have died now, with the exception of a few. Those who have not died will probably in future years, as they are never getting out of Azkaban. There are no followers left, from what your father, Uncle Harry, and the other Aurors have found. All of the Death Eaters were shut up or dead, so the Aurors had their schedules busy with robberies, random acts of violence. The usual._

_Unfortunately, there were a series of attacks on Muggles and Muggle-borns that led to the suspicion that not all of the Death Eaters were safely put away. The Aurors went to the scene of disaster, and they found it to be much more frightening than they imagined. There were people there, dressed as normal wizards and witches, with cloaks and the works, seemingly waiting for them. The Aurors were prepared, but a few came out of the scene hurt and injured. One person was killed. From what your father told me, they were young or middle-aged wizards and witches, scared more of losing that battle than taking lives. It scared everyone._

_There are still people out there that support Voldemort. None have done anything, up until now. That group is still running free, and they are rallying more people to join them. Obviously none of them are as powerful as Voldemort, but they are still supporters, trying to avenge the death of their supposed leader—even though some of them barely looked old enough to have been born before Voldemort's death. We suspect a few of them to be parents of students at Hogwarts, which is where we get into the tricky part of this conversation. I know when you read it you will think it is ridiculous, but your father and I are trying to protect you._

_We believe that, for your safety, you should refrain from conversing with Slytherins, or anyone you believe to be suspicious, whether that be in Gryffindor or any other houses. I realize you have classes with almost everyone, but try not to hang around them all of the time. You will hate us for saying this, but that included your best friend, as well. We cannot keep you from him, or any other person, but we recommend that you do not spend all of your time with him. He is close to you already, so do not tell him anything that is too personal, as it may hurt Uncle Harry or your father in the long run. It may even hurt you. I know you are probably very angry with your father and I now, but it really is to keep you safe. Please attempt to listen to our recommendations._

_Love,_

_Mum_

I told no one about the last paragraph of my letter. I would not even tell my best friend. I still had classes with him—including Divination, which was more of a social class at this point than anything else. Okay, so Divination was a dumb class if you do not have a knack for it. I knew that. However, it was the only class that I really had a good time in, surprisingly enough. Sure, it was not exactly easy for me, like Charms and Transfiguration, but it was exciting. I had grown fond of it as the years passed, much to my mother's chagrin, and taken it every year since my third year. It was probably my hardest class, due to my lack of talent in the Seer direction (which my father said I had inherited from both of my parents, but more so my mother, who could not even complete the class). It never ceased to excite me, though, and I was getting better at the subject everyday. Sure, becoming a Seer was not my future (that much I could predict), but I could read tealeaves.

But it was mostly exciting because my best friend was in the class. I was sure that the only reason he had ever stuck with it was because I did (I knew that it was not because he particularly enjoyed it—he was even more awful at it than I was). We had become friends in Divination in our third year. Ever since then, we have been best friends. I could not just blow that friendship away like a dandelion seed. That was basically what my parents were asking me to do. It was not fair. None of my cousins (or my brother) knew how I felt. Albus pretended that he did—well, he pretended that he knew what I was upset about—but that didn't help. None of their best friends were in Slytherin and were under suspicion by their parents. No one understood how I felt.

Life went on for the most part. It wasn't until my parents had began spying on me that I began to worry even more. Albus was incredibly close to me, perhaps more so than my brother. He was like my parents' dummy. They obviously sent him a letter, explaining the situation to him, and that I was not supposed to hang around with my best friend. He had never cared that I was best friends with a Slytherin. In fact, no one did except for my father (but he just hated the father, so I suppose that is why). As soon as Albus told me that I should ditch my best friend, I knew something was wrong. I knew that my parents had told him to watch me. And I was furious.

"You aren't serious?" I asked him. I knew my face had become almost as red as my hair—which it typically did when I was angry—and I blushed, deepening the red. Albus just nodded at me, and I bit my lip to refrain myself from cursing at him. Finally, I sighed, exhaling all of the anger within me, just to have it bubble up again a second later. "I cannot believe my parents! How dare they tell me who and who I should not be friends with! That isn't fair. They have had no problem with him before this, with the exception of my father occasionally. I don't see why it should be a problem now. It isn't like he's a Death Eater or anything. I should know."

Albus looked frightened for a moment, but his face quickly filled up with anger, like mine. "It isn't your parents telling me to tell you off for hanging around with him. It's just me. I just don't think you should spend every waking moment with Scorpius, especially with our N.E.W.T.s coming up so quickly," he snapped defensively. "Scorpius has you held up outside or in the library all the time, and I just think maybe you should tell him that you want to study a little bit more everyday. And the recent events also has a little bit to do with it, but I am really concerned with your grades more than anything else."

"You are the most awful liar I have ever met in my life, Al," I hissed, my eyes narrowing. "And for your information, all we do in the library is studying, and when we're outside we discuss Divination, with the occasional conversational gossip. My grades are perfectly fine, and you know it. Divination is the only class I have not gotten an O on every year. But I have still received an E, which should be good enough for you. Give up the act, Potter, I know that my parents wrote you and told you to keep an eye on me. I'm not stupid."

He looked more annoyed than anything now, and I knew that I had pushed him over the edge. "All right. Your parents are just trying to keep you safe, Rosie. You should listen to them for once instead of ignoring everything they say," he snapped. I was about to retort, but he cut me off before I could say anything. "I will keep trying to keep your parents happy, but you should know that if you don't listen to me and you get hurt, it isn't my fault. You will bring it onto yourself. You may have the perfect friendship right now, but that doesn't mean it will last forever." He sighed, his expression softening. "I'm just trying to help. No one should live in a dreamland, Rose."

I smiled at him, feeling regret for yelling at him in the first place. I knew he was trying to help. But if I wanted to stay friends with Scorpius, then they had to trust me. I gave Albus a quick hug, saying, "Thanks," in the most gentle voice I could conjure. He nodded and walked silently away as I watched silently. He was right, I would give him credit. As I had said before, I wished that we were not forced to choose sides, because I knew which side I would end up taking. Wishing at this point was stupid and senseless. No one should live in a dreamland. Especially someone like me.

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**Author's Note: **This is my first Novella since _Deathly Hallows _came out! You should all be so proud of me! If you aren't, oh well. I'll get over it. I'm proud of me, so that makes up for any of you who couldn't care less. Anyways, I think it's a given that there were spoilers in this. They list the characters anyways, so if you couldn't figure that out beforehand, then… wow. So, I really hope you enjoy this one. I spent a lot of time just thinking about what I should write before school starts. I'm glad I could finish a first chapter before school. Hopefully the second chapter will come out soon enough. I'll be fast.

Although the majority of this fanfiction will be angst, I am attempting to throw in a lot of humor here and there. There wasn't really anything in this chapter. But it will be funnier later on. Anyways, I hope you enjoy this one!

J.K. Rowling owns all of these characters, and all of their glory. I just own the plot. I wished I owned Scorpius though. Or a younger Draco Malfoy. But alas, I do not. J.K. Rowling does. Because she is awesome.


	2. Chiromancy

**Chapter Two – Chiromancy**

He never came to breakfast. At least, I never saw him there. He wasn't in Potions earlier in the morning, either, but if I could skip that class, I would too (of course, being the excellent student I am, I could never do that). And he was not in Divination, which was really the only class we could truly hold a conversation without getting yelled at by the teacher. At that point, I knew something wasn't right here. Scorpius never missed Divination or Potions. They were the only two classes we had together. I mean, he usually never skipped them. The only reason he would ever skip any of those classes would be if he was angry with me. And I was pretty sure that I had done nothing recently to give him reason to be angry with me. So, I ruled out that. The only other reason I could think of was that something was wrong with his family.

That didn't happen incredibly often, though. He got along quite well with his father and mother, such as I did. There were occasions that Scorpius would fight with one of them, and he would hide in the Slytherin Common Room all day. It wasn't common, though, but he didn't like to talk about it when it happened. I was alright with that, of course, because it wasn't my business. But it worried me anyways. I mean, it is kind of hard to get in a fight with your family when you're at school for the majority of the year. So, when it happened, it worried me how and why, and what was going to happen in the future.

There was something else, though, that could be wrong with his family, keeping him from classes. I had heard from the grapevine (also known as the female students that attended Hogwarts) that his grandmother was in the hospital. Was she doing poorly? I was scared as soon as I realized that her poor health could be the cause of his absence. But surely Professor Longbottom would have informed me by now if my best friend was out due to his grandmother's illness. He knew everything that occurred within Hogwarts, and he knew mostly everything that occurred out of it as well. I had already had Herbology today—and he had said nothing to me.

I traveled outside for lack of anything better to do, hoping that if I laid down by the side of the lake I would feel better. Quite frankly, I felt sick thinking that Scorpius' grandmother could be very ill—or possibly dead. My feet were moving, but I wasn't really paying attention to where I was going. I had nearly walked into two people, only noticing them at the very last instant. My heart was thumping in and out of my chest, and my mind was racing with possibilities of Scorpius' location. It wasn't until I tripped over something that my mind finally got moving again. I flung my hands out in front of me, catching myself before I broke my nose on the ground. I laid there on the ground for a few moments before I heard someone complaining to my side.

"God, watch it, will—Rosie?" a deep voice snapped, calming down as it spoke my name. I rolled over onto my back and sat up, looking behind me to see who the speaker was. "God, Rosie, what the bloody hell are you doing? You usually pay attention when you're walking." I blinked as Scorpius, who sat up straight on the grass a frown thrown over his face, stood up and held out his hand to me.

I looked at his hand, staring at it for a few moments before looking back up at his face. He threw his hand back to his side, and narrowed his eyes at me. "Fine. I was just trying to be nice, helping you up and all, even though you were the one who tripped over me." He turned his back on me and began to walk away—something he did when he was mad at me. But I didn't care about that. I was wondering why he was still here. Apparently nothing was wrong with his grandmother. Perhaps a family problem, again. I watched as he walked away from me, cocking my head to the side. I stood up, sprinting over to the spot where he had moved—the very edge of the lake—and sat down next to him.

"Why weren't you in Divination today?" I asked him, unbuckling my shoes and slipping them off my feet. Scorpius watched as I did so, but chose not to respond. That was typical of him. I placed my shoes next to each other between myself and my friend, and started for my socks. "We missed you today. I had no partner for the activity we did today. It was quite interesting, too. I had to work all by myself with a silly textbook. I hate those things. Everyone was having so much fun, and I was stuck all alone—"

"Well, you weren't the only one not having a good time," Scorpius snapped, watching me pull off my socks and stuff them into my shoes. "I just sat around inside the Slytherin Common Room until I knew classes were over, and then I came out here." I touched the water with my toes, checking the temperature. "The water is kind of cold. Anyways, I'm sorry you were alone in Divination. I'm sorry you were alone in Potions, as well. But it wasn't exactly my fault."

"So, you're grandmother is really sick?" I asked, watching the ripples in the water as I swung my legs around in it. "That's why you weren't in any of your classes today? I remember you telling me the other day that she was in St. Mungo's or something. I figured that maybe she had gotten worse, so you went to go visit her. But you're still here, so I don't really know what to think. Are you just having a bad day, or did you get in a fight with your parents, or is your grandmother is sick? What's going on? You know that you can tell me. You're my best friend, and whenever I am having a bad day, you can fix it."

"You know those cheesy lines don't work on me," Scorpius sneered. "Nice try, Rosie, but I don't particularly want to talk about it right now. Maybe I'll tell you later."

"You do know that you'll have to tell me either way. Why not just tell me now while we're sitting her, rather than make me stalk you down later tonight?" I questioned. "Seriously, you can tell me."

"Fine, then. But don't get mad at me when I tell you why I'm upset. My parents sent me a letter the yesterday, and they told me that my father is suspected of committing some crime or something. Some attack on Muggle-Borns. The Aurors are looking in on the case, and they have been going to my house and trying to talk to my dad. Your dad is an Auror, and my mother suggested that I not affiliate with you anymore. She thinks you aren't trustworthy, and I'll be the reason that my dad will end up in Azkaban," Scorpius sighed. His grey eyes were narrowed into slits as he stared at the water, and I saw the seriousness of the matter.

I realized the connection, then, between my mother's letter to me, and his parent's letter to him. My paranoia returned, like the lot of them were out to break up our friendship. I frowned at him, shaking my head lightly. "He won't end up in Azkaban. Your father would never attack Muggles and Muggle-Borns. I mean, you said he had worked for Lord Voldemort in the past, but it was an awful experience that he had barely lived through. If he had gone through that much trauma, then he would never ask for it again. I would stick up for your father. I could tell mine to lay off. I'm sure he is saying the same thing I am right now, though," I said. "And my Uncle Harry is the head of the Auror Department at the Ministry. He knows that I am best friends with you, and he supports that. My uncle is really nice. He knew your father in school. You won't have to worry about it. I'll do the worrying for you, if you want."

"You're the Head Girl, you have enough stuff to worry about. Besides, your uncle hated my father. And so did your father. I'm pretty sure your dad isn't that fond of me either," Scorpius laughed. "We'll worry about it later, okay?" He smiled weakly at me, but I was still fuming inside. The world was out to get us. I knew that someday in the future something worse was going to happen. We were going to be forced to pick sides at some point. I may be great at Divination, but I could sense that something would happen. I didn't like that feeling, though. My heart was pounding, and my I was shivering.

"You should take your legs out of the water, Rose. You're shivering," he pointed out to me—but of course I already know. But it wasn't the water that was making me shiver. I didn't budge, though. I couldn't make myself move, so instead, I leaned against Scorpius. He didn't object to me doing this, although I could feel through his sudden shift in position that he was uncomfortable. But I didn't move. "What did you do in Divination today that we had to do in partners?"

"Palmistry, also known as Chiromancy. I was really good at this, even though I had to predict my own future with my own hand. I thought it was kind of neat. Give me your hand for a minute. I want to read your palm," I said, reaching for his left hand. The left hand was the hand you were supposed to do. Although, in India, some religion (I don't know which, exactly) that uses palmistry makes the females use the left hand and the males use the right hand. I found that very interesting.

"Oh, no," Scorpius said quickly, trying to pull his hand away from mine. "You are not reading my palm. My life line is short."

"Come on, let me read it," I snapped. He relaxed a bit, allowing me to read it. I looked at his life line, examining the length of the line. "The length of the line really has nothing to do with the length of a person's life. Yours is short, but it is sharp and very defined. It measures the vitality and well-being of your life. It looks pretty good. Mine fades a little in the middle but comes back strong later, which I suspect might mean I will get some sort of sickness during the whole of my life," I explained. I never took my eyes of his hand, but I knew that he was watching me and not his hand. Which was all and well, considering he probably didn't know how to read palms.

"Next is the head line. You are a generally intellectual person. Definitely more analytical than creative. You're pretty hot-headed, too," I said, smiling. "Your heart line it that one that curves there, at the top of your hand. You have a pretty nice love life ahead of you, and you have good cardio vascular strength. Emotionally you can be a little stubborn and won't admit that you are wrong to those you love, but apparently that will have no affect on anything." I felt myself blush as I spoke of the heart line. Not because I liked him or anything. Definitely not—he was just my friend, of course. I just felt awkward talking with him about his emotional stability.

"That line in the middle there," I said, pointing to the line that went vertically down the center of his hand, "is the fate line. Do you want to know what I see? I see you becoming very successful in the future. But do you want to know what I don't see? I don't see you being forced to pick sides because of your parents and my parents. We don't have to pick sides and be separated. I may not be good at predicting the future, but I know that we won't be forced to pick sides."

"You sound pretty good at palm reading to me. That counts as predicting the future," Scorpius said quietly. I stood up, still holding his hand.

"Come with me," I whispered. He stood up, and I started walking towards the castle. I dropped his hand and ran ahead. I was hoping that my palm reading was as good as Scorpius thought it was.

I had reason to think otherwise.

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**Author's Note: **FINALLY! Man, I took a long time. If I took any longer I'd be going backwards. Personally, I'm surprised I found time to write this chapter. I've been so busy lately with sports and school. It's kind of obnoxious how busy I am. Oh well. I'll be faster next time—my sport is almost over.

Happy reading!


	3. Dream Journal

**Chapter Three – Dream Journal**

In Divination, we were assigned a dream journal. We were not required to write in it every night, because some people didn't dream every night, but I usually did. It was interesting to write down what happened in a dream, because when I remembered what had happened, it was like I was reliving it. It was as if I was living a fantasy. I was doing everything that I couldn't do in real life. I could fly without a broomstick, or turn invisible without an invisibility cloak.

Nightmares were always written down, as well. It wasn't like I wanted to write them down, but they were interesting to examine. Apparently, the nightmares I had were because of extreme stress, and I could calculate when the next one would happen by my stress level. I mean, they had kind of been happening more frequently since I had received that letter from my mum. And being Head Girl didn't help that much with my usually high stress level, either.

Scorpius wasn't really one to write in his dream journal. In fact, he didn't dream very often, according to him. And according to the Professor, that basically meant that he was never going to get anywhere in the Divination. I mean, it wasn't as though he was going to go anywhere with Divination, but still… In class, we would examine our dream journals, and he would have nothing written down. He couldn't tell me anything, even after I showed him the bowels of my mind in the night. It was almost embarrassing. Still, I liked keeping a dream journal. Years from now, I could look back at the journal and write a book based on my dreams or something.

Okay, that was pushing it a little.

"Are you writing in that silly dream journal again, Rosie?" Albus asked, coming up behind me. It was early in the morning, and I thought I had been in the only one in the common room. Unfortunately, though, my cousin seemed to know every move I made before I made it. Even my brother didn't care that much about me. But Albus was jokingly unfriendly to me—but still the nicest person in the world, ironically—while Hugo was just a brother. It was annoying how much the younger Potter son knew about me.

"Yes, Al, I am. What are you doing up so early?" I inquired, looking him up and down. He smiled at me and took a seat on the couch, stretching and yawning loudly. I rolled my eyes, and looked at him for an answer.

"What did you dream about?"

I sighed. There was no way I was going to win this battle, even if I had asked him what he was doing up first. He would find some way to get me to answer before him. I handed him the page with my newly written dream on it. It wasn't yet complete—there was a lot that had happened in my dream last night. But it would satisfy him for now, and then he would not bother me for the rest of the day.

_This dream started off a little different from other dreams I have had in the past. It was in black and white, something that doesn't usually happen. The scene was set in a forest. It could have possibly been the Forbidden Forest, but it was hard to tell in black and white. It was warmer than it is in reality, so it would have to take place in the spring or early autumn. The trees were tall, and they were not allowing light to pass through their barriers. The ground was covered with rocks and twigs._

_I was running through the forest, bare-footed. My feet were killing me; pebbles were digging into them, and I knew that they were bleeding. My hair was wild, blowing all around my head so I could barely see anything. I was breathing hard—so much so, that when I woke up, I was almost hyperventilating. I knew only after a few minutes that this wasn't a dream; it was a nightmare._

"_Scorpius!" I cried. I could feel the tears streaming down my face. It was like a finger running down my cheek, and in a minute, it was. Scorpius was in front of me so suddenly. I would have been shocked had I been awake, but because it was a dream, I just collapsed into his arms and let everything out. He just held me and let me cry._

Then, suddenly, he was gone. I was running again, and screaming his name, "Scorpius! Where is my best friend?" There were people following me. I didn't know who they were or why they were following me. They looked different—evil, somehow. And looking back, it looked like one of them was familiar to me. One of them looked like the parent of someone I was very close to. It looked like

"Who?" Albus asked, looking up at me so suddenly that I flinched. I was reading along, remembering the moments in my dream of pure fear. Even when I was in Scorpius' arms, I was afraid. He was there so suddenly and then gone. My best friend… I couldn't ever tell him about this nightmare. He was never in any of my dreams. And I would never "collapse into his arms" as I did in the dream, nor would I tell him that was what I had dreamed happened. That'd be embarrassing. Not to mention it could totally kill a friendship.

Not that I liked him or anything. It would just be awkward. We're not the hugging type.

"Um," I muttered, looking away from him and hoping that he would take that as my answer. But, being Head Boy and a Potter, I highly doubted that he would. "I don't really think I am obliged to tell you. You may be family, but you don't need to know every detail about my life. Or my life when I'm sleeping. Hopefully you'll never find out what happened in the rest of my dream—or who that person was. It's not like it will ever happen."

I was pretty much sure of that. Still, I didn't want to be the one to say that and have it happen. Although, why I would run through a forest bare foot, screaming for Scorpius was a mystery to me. I considered myself smart, and running through a rock-covered ground with no shoes on didn't sound like a great idea. I didn't know anyone who would disagree with me. And the mysterious people following me in the dream? Yeah, I'm no threat in real life. I have no enemies—that much I was positive of.

Okay, maybe my dad and mum had a lot of enemies, but most of them had given up their grudges or died. And why would they come after little ol' me? I was a cute little red head. I wasn't exactly sure Scorpius' father loved me, but he didn't completely hate me. And if I could score points with him, I could score points with anyone. No, scratch that. If I could score points with Asteria Malfoy, Scorpius' mother, I could score points with anyone. Mr. Malfoy was definitely nicer than she was. But I think she liked me more.

Still, I had to make sure that they liked me enough not to come chasing me through the forest. Especially because the one I recognized in my dream was his father.

Breakfast did not come soon enough. I finished writing in my dream journal after Albus left, and worked on an essay for Transfiguration. By the time I had finished the essay, I still had a full half an hour until breakfast began (yes, that was how early I was up). But eventually the time for eating came, and I could find Scorpius.

He was the last one to come into the Great Hall, it seemed, and yet he looked as though he had gotten no sleep at all. He sat down in between my cousin Lily and I and put his head on the table, simply resting. I said nothing to him—it was nice to see him so calm for once, to see him breathing in and out and not have to worry whether he was going to be alright.

"I'm here today. Aren't you happy?" Scorpius asked me, taking the seat opposing me at our table in Divination. I didn't say anything, but I acknowledged his presence by smiling back at him. I could tell that he didn't really want to be here—he didn't even want to be at breakfast this morning. He was slumping over, his elbows on the table.

Professor Fiernze, who had completely replaced Professor Trelawney a few years back, was making his rounds to each table, seeing what people had written in their dream journals. He would never set a date to go around and look at what people had written, mostly because he wanted to see how many people actually did it. The people who did complete the assignment usually did because they either: predicted that the Professor was going to go around and check the following day, or the people that did it were just good students who wrote in it all the time (even if they didn't necessarily dream; they would make it up).

I could hear the centaur applauding some people for what they had dreamed about, telling them that they could possibly see the future through their dreams. I also heard him sighing when he got to a couple of students with empty journals, or dreams that he knew were made up on the spot by the lake of detail. I was only hoping when he got to mine that he said something promising.

He went to Scorpius first, who, for once, had actually written something in his dream journal. While mine was at least twenty pages in, he was only a few. The professor picked it up and read through it, looking extremely serious at what was on the page. Then he placed it back down in front of Scorpius, nodded (probably meaning that it was acceptable, but nothing special) and moved onto mine.

I watched his eyes flicker across the page, flashing as he started a new line. Then, his eyes dashed back up to the top, and I felt my heart lurch. Had I forgotten to add something, making it seem confusing? Or was it just incomprehensible?

"This is very interesting, Ms. Weasley," he said, closing the journal. He didn't hand it back to me, though. "This dream seems very serious. I have heard talk of some events outside of the school, affecting our world and the other. As you said near the end of your dream, you feared there were connections between your dream and what I am going to assume is what I had heard about." He handed my journal to me, and I clutched it tightly in my hands. "This is very interesting…"

That was all he said before he walked away. Scorpius was eyeing me, looking confused. "What, are you a Seer now or something?" he asked, completely seriously. "First the palm reading, now dreams that have connections to… to the thing that's happening with my father, and that whole thing? I mean, the thing with my father is part of this whole thing. What happened in your dream?"

I opened my mouth to say something, but no sound came out. I was holding he journal in my hand even tighter now. "Do your parents like me? No, do they hate me?" I ask him instead of answering the question he had asked me first. He looked taken aback when I asked this, but the look of shock was replaced with a look of confusion right away.

"They don't hate you," he replied slowly. "They hate you less than they like some of my other friends, I know. But you aren't really on the top of their list in terms of liking. It's just because you're a Gryffindor and you're a half-blood, I think. They're still living in the past. You know that. My mum's family was entirely pureblooded, and so was my father's. I don't really think it has anything to do with our families not getting along while they were in school or anything, though."

It was a relief enough for me to relax and fall back against my chair. So, my dream could never happen. Not that I believed that Draco Malfoy would come running through the forest after me anyways. And I didn't believe that he was even involved in the mass Muggle killings. Nothing was going to happen to me. Or Scorpius, for that matter. Still, to be safe, I figured that it would be a good idea to send my father a letter telling him to leave Mr. Malfoy alone.

So, after class, that was exactly what I did. It was short, but it got the point across.

It was a problem, though, that for the rest of the day, I could not stop thinking about that dream/nightmare. Even at dinner, my cousins and brother would say something to me, and I would completely miss it. It wasn't until Hugo shouted my name that I noticed anyone was trying to talk to me in the first place.

"I think you're studying a little too much for the N.E.W.T.s, Rosie," he said, rolling his eyes at me. I shook my head and bit into a chicken leg. "Did you hear what I said about the Daily Prophet? The headline today?" I shook my head once again, and I heard Albus snicker beside me. Oh, if Scorpius had been sitting with us for supper, he would have been rolling on the floor laughing by now.

Hugo slapped down the Daily Prophet in front of me, and I picked it up to get a better look at it. I dropped the chicken leg with a clatter onto my plate and clamped my other hand down onto the other side of the paper, straightening it out. The heading read:

5 Muggles Dead, 2 Wizards Arrested 

And I was positive that Scorpius would not be laughing.

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**Author's Note:** Well, finally. So, I thought I would have this chapter up super fast since my sports stuff ended, but I lied, apparently. I found out about NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and so I started planning out my thing for that. That killed a ton of my time. So, that took up all of October, and then the National Writing Month started in November. I had to write a 50,000+ word novel in a month. That was super intense. I thought I was gonna die. I wrote 4,000 words a day (well, I wrote a chapter a day, and each of my chapters was 4,000+ words). Why can't I write a 4,000 word chapter for this?

But I WON! WHOO! I finished my first 50,000+ word novel. December was for editing, so I did some of that. Plus, there was holiday break. By the way, Happy New Year! I have been writing on this site for almost thee years.

Still, I know my writing skills are a ton better, but I was not at all pleased with this chapter. Well, I liked the beginning, if you want my honest opinion. But the middle to the end was completely awful. Oh well, maybe I'll still get some good reviews.

Scratch that, I hope I get reviews in general.

Well, have a Happy New Year, and I will seriously update faster. I have more free time than I did before, so it won't take three months to update the next chapter. If it does, we have a serious problem…

Seriously.


	4. Your Father

**Chapter Four – Your Father…**

How had the Aurors already arrested two people for the muggle attacks? For all they knew, there could be a plague or something wiping out the Muggle population. I mean, it was not very likely, but it was still possible. Maybe the muggles were killing each other. It didn't always have to be us. There were serial killers in the muggle world. Another possibility could be that the wizards they arrested were being framed, and the real murders were still out there. The possibilities were endless here. There was just no way that they could have arrested people already unless they had actually seen them commit the murders.

It wasn't like I wanted the murders to continue killing all of these Muggles. If they had really captured two of the wizards who were helping with the Muggle killings, then they would be able to capture the rest of them very quickly. There had to be more than two people in the organization of people against Muggles. How many people were still alive that thought Voldemort had the right idea? Hundreds, I was sure. And they had to be building up a plan for years, otherwise there would have been more activity in the past twenty-four years since my uncle defeated Voldemort.

No, these villains were smarter than that. They couldn't be like all of those villains in the muggle books I read; those were stupid, and I always wanted to jump in and tell them what they were doing wrong. These real life villains had just started coming out, hadn't they? They had been hiding for the past twenty-four years, meeting secretly without the Aurors noticing. They had been planning everything that was going to happen, and how it was going to happen. No one was stupid enough to just go on a mass murder run without a plan. Well, I wouldn't know, but there had to be something wrong with how fast everything was happening.

My father and uncle were some of the best Aurors in the business. Their work had slowed down a lot since the Death Eaters had disbanded. In fact, it was questionable whether some of the newer Aurors were prepared for this kind of work. They had probably met up with some insane people before, but it would be nothing compared to what they were about to face. They were going to be up against pure evil—what kind of people killed other humans just because they can? What do they really have against them?

"Some people are just different," my mother had told me once when my father came home one day. He had just arrested a man who had killed another wizard earlier that day. I had broken down crying when I heard the news, and asked why people killed other people. "They have problems. They could be psychological, or they could hold a grudge. I'm not entirely sure that murderers know what they are doing when they kill someone. Voldemort did. But he was insane, wasn't he?"

The Daily Prophet didn't name the two wizards who were arrested, although I dearly wished that they would. Scorpius' father was being questioned, wasn't he? What if he had been arrested—especially after I had sent the letter to my father earlier today—and nobody had known about it? Scorpius had indeed been more talkative today than he had yesterday, but he was quiet for the rest of Divination after I asked if his parents hated me.

I looked around the Great Hall to see if Scorpius was here, seeing him sitting quietly with his Slytherin friends. Jeanie Thomas, who was a year younger than Scorpius and me, was saying something to Scorpius in which he replied loudly, "I'm fine!" The Great hall became quieter, and I could have sworn I heard Lily giggling. My eyes narrowed, and the Great Hall became louder again.

"I'll be right back," I said to anyone who cared, and stood up to have a chat with Scorpius. It looked as though he needed to cool off anyways, and if we went to the library, he was sure to cool off there. It wasn't as if he could yell in there, anyways.

He didn't notice me come up behind him, even though Jeanie was smiling up at me as I walked up to their table. I slipped my hand into Scorpius', making him jump and swing around on his bench. I didn't laugh at this, though, as I would have on any other day. I had some business I needed to take care of, and it was serious. I had the Daily Prophet still clutched in my hand, but he wasn't looking at that. He was looking at my hand in his, his face twisted into that of confusion.

"Come with me. I need to talk to you," I said, tugging on his hand gently. He looked at me, blinking slowly, and stood up to follow me to wherever I was taking him. Jeanie and the other Slytherins who were sitting at his table were smirking. I knew exactly what they were thinking, and by the looks on their faces, they were going to be all whispers as soon as we disappeared. I could hear the rumors flying already. I was going to stand my ground for whatever was going to come.

It was sick, how fast lies could spread—stories of misconception that never happened. It was strange how people enjoyed watching their own kind shrink into themselves, haunted by the secrets told about them. And it was disgusting how people found amusement from torturing other people into the oblivion of school drama.

And everything I just said was so cheesy that I should naturally be put on a birthday card. However, in all seriousness, that was really what happened when rumors were spread. The truth is manipulated into a lie, which is twisted into a bigger lie, which might as well be a death sentence to the person whom the lie is about. To escape from a rumor is a feat.

"What's going on?" Scorpius asked me as I dragged him up the Grand Staircase to the library. I could already tell that his temper was rising again—he didn't like being left out of the circle. He snapped his hand away from mine, but I kept moving forward anyways. If he was curious enough, he would follow without me dragging him. "What could be so important that you couldn't say to me in front of my other friends? I say everything that I feel to you in front of _your_ friends."

The library was silent when we got there. I wasn't even sure that the librarian was there—she was probably at supper, eating. But that was fine with me. It was one less person that would be trying to hear our conversation. This was possibly my favorite place inside the school. I spent time in here reading books—including muggle books that my mum said I would love. It was neat having a muggle-born mother, because I was introduced to things that other people weren't. Some of these muggle authors were really good.

"I'm sorry that I dragged you off like that," I apologized, sitting down on top of one of the tables and swinging my feet around. He stood in front of me, looking curiously at my dancing legs. I was being distracting. "You seemed a little off… at dinner in particular. The thing with the shouting?" That was enough said for him to lock his silvery eyes on mine. "I don't suppose you've had a chance to read the Daily Prophet, have you? There was something in there that worried me a little."

I handed the paper to him, and he read it quickly, scanning through the article in only a few seconds. He handed it back to me, and I put it beside me on the table. "Rose…" he muttered, trailing off after my name. I didn't know what he was about to say to me, but it worried me. I hoped it really was not his father that was one of the two arrested.

"Was it your dad?" I asked quietly. I was embarrassed to ask this—my face was turning red, as were my ears. I could feel them burning, which was a key sign that they were turning a bright pink. This happened to my father whenever my mum said something that made him embarrassed.

He looked at me, his eyes (such a spooky, haunting color) examining my face. He had watch my lips move as I spoke as if he could not hear what I had said to him, and I wasn't entirely sure that he had. He must have been a good lip reader, since he shook his head slowly and finally locked his eyes with mine. I felt a shudder of relief.

Except, I was afraid that the shudder wasn't exactly because I was relieved.

"I don't know who it was, but I would have heard by now if it was my dad. My mother would have contacted me, or you could have heard from your dad or cousins. I know he's okay for now," Scorpius said, forming a weak smile across his face. "But you saw this coming, didn't you? This must have had something to do with your dream. Why else would Professor Firenze be so interested in your dream journal. Something you said must have been right. Did you see my dad being arrested?"

_Close_, I wanted to say, _but not exactly_. I couldn't tell him yet what happened in my dream. If something else happened—if his father was proven to have something to do with everything that was happening, maybe I would tell him. But for now, I would have to tell him everything I could so he wouldn't want to hear about my dream right now.

I took the Daily Prophet, balled it up, and threw it across the desk to the trash barrel on the other side. It hit the side, bounced off, and landed on the floor right next to it. I was never very good with my aim. Scorpius pulled out his wand and whisked it into the barrel, shaking his head lightly at my lack of skill in the shooting department.

"I didn't see your dad getting arrested. What I dreamt about really doesn't matter. You know I have no Seer ability. Divination is the only class that I can't pass with an O. And the palm reading—they have everything about it in one of the books in the classroom. Defined lines mean so and so, and weak lines mean the opposite. And how can you really predict someone's life by the lines they have on their hands?" I asked sharply, and he frowned at me.

"But you always seem so much better at the stuff than I do. You sounded so sure of yourself when you were reading my palm," he muttered almost miserably. "Professor Firenze said that your dream in your dream journal was interesting. If he said that, there must be something going on there. Why won't you tell me what happened? You even avoided telling me in Divination today. What was so awful about it that you can't tell your best friend?"

I felt guilt rising up inside of me. How dare he use the 'best friend' ploy to try to get me to tell him. "I won't tell you because it's never going to happen. Why do we have to worry about it if it has no impact on our lives?"

"It could have an impact on our lives!" Scorpius shouted. His blonde hair was falling in his eyes, and he quickly brushed it away with one swift move. I sat still for a moment, watching him as he glared angrily at me.

"You don't even know what it's about. How could you decide that?" I asked quietly. I had stopped swinging my legs around and began fiddling with my fingers. His eyes traveled to them.

He continued to stare at them and whispered, "You won't tell me."

I stood up, walking past him towards the doors to the hallway. "Scorpius, some things you're better off not knowing. If you really want to know, then I'll tell you. I don't believe it, though. Just know that. If you do, then you're making a mistake, and I won't even bother saying I told you so. Why do you want to know something that you're better off not knowing?"

"Rose, I want to know," he said, in the same tone as before.

"I was running through the forest, you were there, and then you were gone. Then, I saw your father chasing after me. He was one of the people connected to the events that are going on now. There were other people too, but he was the only one I recognized," I said, facing him once again, going against my own rules in telling him. "But that couldn't happen. You're father is innocent."

"Maybe you're right," he murmured, brushing past me—nearly knocking me over—and leaving without another word. I didn't know what he had said that to; was I right about my dream (was it going to happen), or was I right about my real prediction (that his father was innocent). And I realized all I was saying was a prediction. And if I was really as bad as I said I was at Divination, then I would be wrong.

It was unfortunate that many Seers could predict things through their dreams.

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**Author's Note:** I wasn't entirely fond of the beginning of this chapter, but I kind of like the end. There was one paragraph that I wrote in the middle of one of my classes, and I absolutely loved it. It ended up turning out a little bit different once I typed it up, though, but it still kept the parts I loved. I wonder if you can find that paragraph…

I'm finally getting my fanfiction groove back on, I think. When I really get into something, I can update in just days, and I am totally into this right now. It only took me, what, two days to write this chapter? It isn't a record, but it is definitely faster than the time it has taken me to write some of the chapters for this.

And I can update a lot faster because of NaNoWriMo. I wrote 4,000 word chapters each day, and that really helped me improve. I know they advise you not to edit in the middle of writing in NaNoWriMo, but I always did, so that prepared me even more for this. I think everyone who writes for this website could do a NaNoWriMo. If I can do it, you can! It isn't until next November, though.

Anyways, I love Scorpius. I wish I could have incorporated some other characters into this chapter, but it was basically meant for Scorpius and Rose. I think you can kind of see their relationship a little bit more now. And I had to make sure that they got into a fight when no one was around to witness it.

Anyways, anything that you recognize (characters, setting, etc.) belongs to J.K. Rowling. I should probably add a disclaimer, don't you think? Hehe.


	5. Ignorance Is Bliss

**Chapter Five – Ignorance Is Bliss**

"Scorpius!" I yelled, dragging it out to make it more syllables than it really was. I watched as the double doors of the library swung shut behind him, and I felt anger swell up inside of me. How dare he walk away from me? How dare he just leave me when I could have given him some sort of proof that my dream was false? He was being arrogant—a trait which I knew he had inherited from his father. This was the reason I doubted why I was friends with him. He was too haughty for his own good.

"_Do you mind if my cousin and I sit here? Yours is the only roomy compartment left," I said quietly. I was quite scared to be talking to the boy who my father had advised me to beat at every test—and told me not to marry, which was weird enough at this age, anyways. I loved my Granddad. And I could not let him down by getting friendly with the overly blonde boy sitting in this compartment. Scorp—Scorpion—Scorpius? I couldn't remember what my father had said his name was._

"_If you must," he replied, looking at me for just a moment before he turned his eyes back to the window. I could hear James chuckling behind me before he patted Albus on the back and told him that he was going to find his friends. The blonde kid didn't even look up when I was sure that he had heard James speak—something I did whenever I heard people speaking. I tried to listen to everything I could at once, so I would know what was going on. I wasn't fond of this boy, and he had only said three words to me._

_Albus and I sat down on the seat opposite the blonde boy. It wasn't a surprise to me that he was sitting all alone. He wasn't very loquacious—a word I had heard my mother use over and over. I would have thought that being a first year, which I could obviously tell he was by the way he was playing with his fingers like Albus was, he would try to be as talkative as possible, so he could make some new friends. I didn't know what his problem was, exactly, but it shouldn't have bothered me at all._

"_What are you looking at?" the boy snapped, and I realized that I had been staring at him. Albus looked at me with a worried expression, and I inhaled sharply, blushing. I hadn't noticed that I had been watching the boy so closely—when I thought about things, I usually zoned completely out. It was awful. My mum and dad made fun of me all the time for it._

"_Oh… um… I like your shirt. It's really nice. A, um, nice material," I said, thinking of the first excuse that came to mind. Okay, so it wasn't really that great an excuse, but I wasn't going to tell him that I thought he was being antisocial. That would just be rude—and I was not a rude person. In fact, I was a very nice person. Nice enough to compliment his shirt, at least._

"_It's cotton," he said hotly. My face was beginning to burn with embarrassment, and I bit my lip to keep myself from saying anything else that was stupid. "Cotton isn't exactly that nice. You're wearing the same thing as far as I can tell. And so are you." He nodded over to Albus, who immediately looked down at his shirt to see if the blonde boy was right._

"_What's your problem?" I asked loudly, causing Albus to jump beside me. He touched my arm, but it was too late. When I was worked up, I stayed that way until all of my anger was gone. Albus usually just watched me and tried to calm me down. But I received my temper from my parents. I couldn't help it that I was got angry quickly._

"_My problem?" the blonde kid repeated, looking confused for a moment before his face twisted into an angry expression._

"_I complimented your shirt, and then you have to be a… a jerk! Why are you being so mean? I'm a first year, too, you know. Why aren't you being nice to everyone so you can make friends?" I snapped, watching him with narrowed eyes. He looked shocked that I would lash out at him like that, but at the same time he looked frightened._

_He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing can out. Instead, it was Albus that spoke next. "What house do you want to be in?" he asked the blonde kid, changing the subject. I fell back angrily against my seat—this conversation was not over yet. I didn't want it to be. I still had more to say, even if no one wanted to hear it._

"_I don't know," he admitted, looking at Albus with a softened expression. He looked worried now—there were no other emotions mixed in with it. He didn't know which house he wanted to be in. But then again, neither did I. I had been sure that I had wanted to be in Gryffindor like my parents, but after hearing what Uncle Harry had said to Albus, I wasn't sure at all. I could be in any house I wanted, couldn't I?_

"_Me neither," Albus and I said simultaneously, and we laughed, causing the blonde boy to join in with us. It took a while for us to calm down—I couldn't remember what was funny in the first place, if anything._

"_Albus Potter."_

"_I'm Rose Weasley," I said, holding my hand out. The boy looked scared for a minute, as if he was afraid that I was going to hurt him if he shook my hand. Slowly, though, he reached his hand out and shook mine. When I didn't do anything to him, he smiled at me._

"_Scorpius Malfoy," he replied. He turned on Albus and held out his hand, which Albus shook right away. He looked back at me and waggled a finger in my direction. I thought he was going to threaten me, but instead, he said something that I would have not expected. I mean, I had yelled at him, and he had been a jerk to me. But he said it anyways:_

"_I think I like you."_

I left the library and tried my hardest to follow him. I knew where he was going—he would not go back to the Great Hall, which I was sure he thought I was going to look first. He always thought that he was not predictable, but I knew every move he made before he made it. He was going to the dungeons, back to the common room where he spent so much of his time sulking in the dark, damp space. He was stupid to think that I wouldn't know where he was going—which further proved that he was arrogant.

I ran down the Grand Staircase, trying to catch up with my friend. I was not about to let something as silly as this break up what I had worked so hard to keep. Albus had never been that fond of Scorpius, even though he seemed to like him enough during our first year of school. The next year, however, Albus acted as if he didn't know who Scorpius was. I didn't know what had happened—had Harry told things about Draco Malfoy that scared Albus away?

Both my mother and father had told me stories of their years at Hogwarts, minus their seventh (in which they did not attend school). I knew that my father and mother were enemies with Mr. Malfoy even during my first year. I had come home for Christmas and informed my parents that my best friend was a Slytherin named Scorpius Malfoy. Of course, the first thing my dad asked was if I was beating him at every test like he had told me to. My mother was thrilled, and then went into a frenzy of tales of her childhood. It was torture.

I found him in the Entrance Hall, heading into the dungeons as I suspected. I sprinted to catch up to him and tugged on his shoulder for him to face me. His arm swung and almost hit me in the face, but I bent out of the way. He watched me as I stood up straight and inhaled, building up for the big speech that I had not prepared. I was going to have to wing this one.

"I'm sorry. You didn't give me a chance to explain everything that has been going on with me. You have to listen to me. You have to believe me, Scorpius, that it was just a dream. It isn't abnormal to dream—and it isn't abnormal to have nightmares," I said, putting both of my hands on his shoulders. Right now, I felt more like Head Girl than his friends. I felt as though I was advising him to do something, and I didn't really like that feeling. It seemed like more of a Albus thing, to me.

"It isn't abnormal for normal people to dream. Normal people like muggles. Normal people like people who don't have magical ability and don't know anything about magic. Normal people who can't predict the future—those people who think that they can, but they can't. Rose, it is abnormal for people like us to have dreams like that. You have taken Divination for the past four years. How do you know that you don't have the ability to predict the future? Huh, Rose? How do you know that?"

"Don't you think that if I had any Seer ability that I would know about it by now?" I was yelling now—in fact, I was surprised that people weren't coming to see what all of the commotion was about. "You're right, Scorpius, I have taken Divination for the past four year. And it has always been my worst class. Becoming a Seer won't just happen all of a sudden? If you have it, you have it, and I don't have it!"

"How do you know that, Rose?" he snapped, throwing my hands off of his shoulders and pointing a finger in my face. "You could have predicted that my father had something to do with the muggle killings, and he could be arrested! What you saw could mean the end of our friendship, and you're in complete denial about it!"

"You think I'd abandon you if your father was a part of this?" I asked, completely dumbfounded. "Because if that's what you think, then why are we friends in the first place? I wouldn't just leave you in the dust just because your father was a felon. If that's who you think I am, you don't know me at all, Scorpius. And I don't think that I know you."

He stepped away from me, his hands by his side and eyes wide. "I didn't say that," he said softly. "I was thinking that my mother wouldn't want me hanging around you anymore if he was arrested. Either that or Albus would try to keep you as far away from me as possible. He hates me already, and if my father was a proven murderer, he would watch my every move. He's too protective of you."

"Oh, don't go insulting my family!" I cried, turning my back on him. "I came down here to apologize to you, even though I did absolutely nothing that I could control. Not to mention that you were the one that wanted to know what I had dreamt about in the first place, so it's more your fault than anyone else's! I did nothing! But I still took the liberty to come apologize anyways! And then you go and turn it into a fight! I didn't want to fight with you. I just wanted to fix this…"

I was crying now. I could feel the hot tears streaming steadily down my face, and I was glad that I was facing away from him. But he touched my shoulder and spun me around—he could hear me crying. His eyes followed a tear, and it took me a while to realize that he had reached up a hand to swipe it away.

"Don't…" I said, backing further away. "If you want this friendship to be over, then by all means…"

Scorpius frowned at me, stepping forward and wiping another tear off of my face. I stepped back again, but as soon as I did, he took one forward. "Stop it," he ordered, and I froze. More tears fell down my face, but he didn't touch me again. "You know you don't mean that. I don't want this friendship to be over anymore than you do. I'm just frustrated. Wouldn't you be worried if your father was at risk of being arrested? Wouldn't you be acting like I am? I'm stubborn anyways."

"Yes, you are," I agreed, smiling at him and wiping my eyes dry. "I'm sorry about this. But I'm a girl, and I'm emotional. It isn't my fault. Do I have make up running down my face now?"

"Just a bit," he admitted, smiling back at me. "I'm sorry, Rose, for overreacting."

I shrugged it off. I was just glad that we could resolve our fights without curses being thrown and cold shoulders. Scorpius, however arrogant he was, was the greatest best friend I could ever ask for. As long as we could solve any problems that came our way, we would be friends for life. And I was positive that we could solve all of them.

Except, some of them were completely out of our control.

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**Author's Note:** Wow, I can't believe that I finished this chapter so… late. I mean, I totally had all of the ideas floating in my head, and then all of a sudden I just blanked out. I started writing something and then I completely changed it. I mean, the concept remained the same (I only had four paragraphs at the time), but the flashback was never there. I like the flashback, though. I think it's nice to get to know Scorpius more.

J.K. Rowling owns everything you recognize, i.e. characters, setting, etc.


	6. Thumb Wars

**Chapter Six – Thumb War**

We did not go back to dinner after our resolved fight. I actually felt sick after shouting at Scorpius; I couldn't eat anything else even if I wanted to. Scorpius had grabbed my hand—something that he never did, so I was too shocked to even wonder where he was dragging me (not to mention my heart jumped)—and started pulling me outside. I hadn't objected to this, even though I probably should have. It was against the rules to go outside after supper. But Scorpius had assured me that we wouldn't get in trouble; supper wasn't over yet, anyways.

The first thing I noticed when we were walking down was that his hair was so blonde that we wouldn't need a wand to guide our way at all. Alright, I guess that was a bit of an exaggeration. When we were at the edge of the lake, he sat down, still holding my hand. I wasn't tall enough for him to yank me down as he did this; my brother had received the tall genes from my father. Not to mention that Scorpius was at least five inches taller than I was, meaning that sitting down I was barely taller than he was. Okay, so maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration as well. He really was a lot taller than I was, though.

I sat down next to him and watched the moon reflect off of the water. It wasn't entirely dark yet, but the moon was already shining. It was a waning gibbous, something that we had to learn for Divination (because strange things happened at full moon, supposedly). I wondered if that logic was correct, though. This moon—this waning gibbous—could be causing everything that was happening right now. How else could I explain Scorpius holding my hand? I was still in shock.

Sometimes, it was hard to believe that we were seventeen years old now. I was Head Girl—which was scary all in itself. Scorpius was at the top of his muggle studies class; something that I was sure his pureblood family was incredibly ashamed about. We had met at such a young age, and our parents were the first ones to tell us not to become friends. I think that was probably the only thing I have really done wrong in their eyes. But seven years had past, and I was still doing the wrong thing in everyone's eyes.

"Scorpius," I said quietly. I dragged it out so it had sounded more like a question than anything else, but even if he didn't want to hear what I was going to say, he would have to anyway. "Did you hear what my parents had told me the first day we met? They were talking about you, and your dad nodded at us. I'm assuming that you looked over when he did that." Scorpius shook his head. "My dad told me to beat you at every test, and not to get too friendly with you."

"Hey, the one rule you've ever broken!" he announced happily, forcing me into a thumb war. He seemed way too excited about this—I would have thought that he would be insulted that my father wanted me to beat him at every test. And that he didn't want me to be friends with a Malfoy. "Well, okay, you haven't broken the 'beat me at every test' thing, but there's still time for that. You think we're too friendly with each other?" He snickered, not looking at our hands anymore.

I was watching our thumbs twiddle around each other, and I was struggling. "You know, I think I'm failing this test," I admitted, smiling as I tried to hold his thumb down; I could only do it for three seconds. "You have longer thumbs than me, this isn't fair. One, two, three, four! Scorpius, stop! You're a boy, I'm a girl! You're supposed to be a gentleman and let me win!" I was failing miserably. That wasn't even the worst part, either. He was laughing at me.

It seemed to end so fast. He held my thumb down against our entwined hands and counting slowly to ten. It seemed to go by so much faster, though, and I knew I was done. I gave up after he counted to five. He had won, only proving that he was not a gentleman. He was a boy who wouldn't let his best friend win. He was a boy who fought his way to victory and won. I liked that about him, though; he would not let me win just because he could.

"Good game," I said, holding out my hand for him to shake, and just as he reached for it, I pulled it away. He laughed, leaning closer to the lake and splashing the cold water up at me. I didn't scream, though, but I did open my mouth in a shocked expression. My clothes were damp, with spots of darker colors where I was hit with the water. My hair, short and frizzy, was becoming puffier by the second, expanding out from being wet. I stood up and ran back towards the castle.

Dinner had just ended when we got back inside; I could tell by the hoards of people running around the castle. It was a lucky thing that no one saw us come back in, but I didn't think anyone would tell on us anyway. Still, Scorpius and I stealthily moved to the hallway going down to the dungeons, just in case someone was running off to the headmaster.

"I'll see you later," I told him, standing against the wall and touching the wet spots on my shirt. "Look what you did to my hair!"

Scorpius laughed at me and began to walk away, heading down into the dungeons for a well-deserved rest, especially after our little fight. It was apparent that Scorpius wasn't as tired as I was, but there was something about crying that always made me so exhausted. It was as if I had shattered all of my energy crying, and I was so worn out that I just needed to sleep.

I started back up to the Gryffindor Common Room, overly excited that it was getting late. I had finished all of my homework earlier, except for an essay that I was going to put off until tomorrow. My mother would always complain about me putting things off until the last minute—something, she said, I had gotten from my father—but I didn't do it often. There were only rare cases, like the one tonight, that I would hold schoolwork. It would always be something important.

And if fighting with a best friend wasn't important enough to push homework aside, I wasn't sure what was. There was just no way that I was going to do that assignment tonight.

When I got up to the common room, Albus was leaning up against the wall, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. I hadn't noticed how toned he was until this moment; it was obvious that Quidditch was helping with this. It struck me as a mystery that he didn't have a girlfriend, although I had heard that he fancied Katy Ainsworth, one of my good friends. I almost doubted that she liked him back, though.

Still, I wondered why he was looking at me so… nastily. It wasn't like Albus to be mad at me, especially because I was related to him. If he was mad at me, I wanted to run up into the girl's dormitory before he could catch me, and talk to him in the morning. By then—if he was mad at me—he would be cooled down, and might not have remembered what he was mad at me for.

I wasn't fast enough, apparently, because he caught me right before I could get to the stairs. "Hey," I greeted, dragging the word out and flattening my hair with my wand. He stepped back with the flick of my wand, apparently worried that I was going to curse him. The fear, which had been there for only a second, disappeared quickly. "I'm going to bed."

"It's only seven o'clock…" he exclaimed, looking shocked before he replaced that expression with a serious one. "I need to talk to you. I was heading to the bathroom a little while after you left to talk to Scorpius, and I heard shouting in the Entrance Hall. I went to go see what was going on… you know, being Head Boy, I should probably know—" I wanted to tell him that he needn't explain that to me; I was Head Girl, I should already know what to do.

"—and I saw you and Scorpius fighting. You were crying, and it stung to see you looking so hurt," he admitted, looking almost sad. "Ever since the news came out about the muggle attacks, nothing has been going right for the two of you. He's acting strange, isn't he? Not to mention, his father could possibly be a criminal, which might be the reason why."

I gaped at him. How could he even suspect my best friend? Sure, things had been a little tense since the muggle killings started, but hadn't I just worked that out?

"I saw you coming in from outside with him, too," he said, looking at me with flashing eyes. He wasn't stalking me, or anything, I knew. He was just being worried, like an older brother. My own brother Hugo would never dream of actually worrying about me. I was closer to Albus than I was to Hugo. "You know that it isn't allowed to be outside after dark, right?"

"Of course I do," I said, running a hand through my hair—which was even harder to do now that it was wet, even though I had straightened it out. "It's not like you don't break the rules. I've seen you going out to visit Hagrid after hours, when you should technically be doing your rounds… inside. So, don't even complain about me. You're breaking two rules at once—only you're doing it by abusing your title."

Albus blushed at this, and I smiled out of satisfaction. "You've gone to visit him after hours, too," he shot back. It was probably a good thing that no one was close enough to hear what we were talking about—we were awful rule-breaking Heads, apparently. "And you've gone to Neville's office after hours, too. You went to the library, too!"

"This isn't about what rules we're breaking! You've broken your fair share, and I have too. Let's not argue over who has broken more, all right?" I snapped, feeling my face getting hotter. Okay, so I've gone to Neville to talk about things going on at home before—and Herbology assignments; he was a biased graded, but that was okay with me. I've gone to Hagrid because he was so fun to talk to, and he made great tea. And I've also snuck into the dungeons to talk to Scorpius before, but we needn't talk about that.

Albus nodded in agreement, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand, looking awkwardly at me. "You're right. I just think that breaking rules with Scorpius isn't exactly the smartest thing in the world to do, especially because his father has been accused of doing all of this. He used to be a Death Eater, you know. Why wouldn't he be one now?"

"He hated it! He only did it because if he didn't, he would probably be killed," I muttered, looking down at the auburn colored rug. "Sure, he was an ass. But he wasn't an evil one. Scorpius is different than his father, anyways."

"I know that, but his father… if you're involved…" He was murmuring now, and I rolled my eyes at this.

"His father is innocent!" I yelled, and people finally began to stare. Lily, who had been sitting on the couch reading, closed her book and walked over to us. He red hair was flowing gracefully behind her, emitting a sort of grace that I envied.

She looked at me, shaking her head. "You guys fight more than James and I," she said, patting Albus on the back. "No, you fight more than he fights with James." She pointed to Albus for that one. I laughed, particularly because I knew how much Albus and James didn't get along. The closeness in age was difficult for them.

Lily walked back to her spot on the couch, yelling at someone as they tried to sit down before her. It was frightening that she was the same age as my brother—Lily was too smart for her own good.

"Rosie," Albus said calmly, putting his hand on my shoulder, "like I said before, I'm just trying to protect you. But don't you think you should get rid of Scorpius before you really get hurt? I mean, don't get rid of him. That sounds a little mean. Just… you're going to get hurt one way or another. Be careful. Please?"

I raised an eyebrow. _I was going to get hurt one way or another?_ What was that supposed to mean? "What are you talking about? Why would I get hurt? He's my best friend. Even if something did happen to his father, nothing would happen to us."

"You like him," he replied, rubbing the back of his neck again.

"Well, of course I like him." I laughed, punching my cousin on the arm. "He's my best friend. I'd be worried if I didn't like him."

Albus blushed, rubbing his nose now. He moved his hands a lot when he was nervous, I noticed. It was like his defense mechanism. If I tried out for a play, I would just throw up over everyone. If he tried out for a play, though, he would just start rubbing his nose and neck. I could only imagine how he managed to make the Quidditch team without actually having any hands on his broom. He was using one to rub his nose or neck, and he was using the other one to hold the Quaffle.

"No, I mean… you like him. Well, you love him," he murmured. I almost didn't hear what he had said, but I caught it at the last second. I wanted to scream. This was the most embarrassing thing ever.

However, when I actually thought about it, he was right. I mean, how many times did I have to deny that I liked him? And in my dream, he had held me, and I liked it. He had held my hand earlier, and my heart went crazy. I had known him for so long; it was bound to happen. He was so nice, and handsome, and wonderful. He was so arrogant!

I understood what Albus meant, though. Scorpius had gone out with a bunch of girls—all of them much better looking than I was. I mean, I was short, and I had short red hair that expanded when it got wet. They were all gorgeous, and I was just bland. I only wore a little bit of makeup: eyeliner and mascara. They were loaded with it. I was going to get hurt because I wasn't what Scorpius wanted. Even if I was, what if he found someone better? There was no happy ending for me.

I knew in the end, Albus was right. I was in love with my best friend; I just wasn't sure that I wanted to be.

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**Author's Note:** Hello! I have finally updated again—which kind of stinks in a way, because I have gone over five chapters. Which basically means that there are a lot less people to request reviews from. Oh well. Maybe I can convince people to review this chapter because I hated it so much.

Seriously. I hated this chapter with a burning passion. I didn't like it at all. Okay, except maybe the paragraph about Albus playing Quidditch with no hands and the second to last paragraph (because aren't those girls the stereotypical ones that everyone wants to be; the ones we hate and envy at the same time?). But still. Two out of, like, fifty paragraphs isn't good. (

Anyways, credit goes to J.K. Rowling for the characters and setting and everything you recognize. I only did the plot, OC characters, some other stuff. Yeah.

So, guys, review! I know how many reads I get… and I know how many reviews I get. It isn't really good. I have a ton of reads—now I need more reviews. Especially for this chapter since I didn't like it! I want to know what you think!

Thanks so much!


	7. Fairytales

**Chapter Seven – Fairytales**

When I was younger, say seven or eight, I believed that the princesses from Muggle fairytales actually existed. I believed that there was a Cinderella somewhere who had gone from a maid to a princess overnight. I believed that because I could do magic, I was going to end up being a fairy Godmother someday and granted some random girl's wishes.

I wanted to be one of those princesses, not the fairy Godmother. There was that one princess that fell into a coma for biting into an apple—an apple, of all things; I never trusted them again—and a random prince came and kissed her. Suddenly, she was all better, and they rode off into the sunset to get married! How long had they known each other? Five minutes—minus their meeting in the very beginning of the story. I literally thought people fell in love like that.

Of course, since I knew magic existed, I truly thought these things happened. I thought that apples could be turned into a sleeping draft and spinning wheels could, too. I thought people could turn into dragons—I'd seen people turn into birds and mammals before. I also thought that a kiss was really all it took to be in love.

I had a Muggle friend named Jeremy—a boy, of course. Albus, Jeremy, and I would play together at the local park after he got home from school (my mother "home schooled" me). One day at the park, I decided to find out what love felt like, so I lay down in the middle of the grass and waited for Jeremy to find me.

"_Rose, what are you doing?" he asked me when he saw me lying in the middle of the lawn with my eyes shut. I didn't respond or open my eyes, but I could picture him in my mind; he had brown hair like the prince in the fairy tale I had read earlier, and it was falling in his face as he looked at me._

"_Rose!" Albus shouted, and I could picture him running off to find my dad or his dad. I remained silent, and I was attempting to choke down a laugh; princesses didn't laugh while they were in comas._

_I could feel Jeremy begin to shake me, and I knew then that he was going to make this a lot more difficult than it ought to be. Princes didn't shake their princesses._

_So, I reached up and found his face with my hands and pulled him down. I forced his lips onto mine and waited for something magical to happen. I waited to feel what love felt like. Jeremy only slapped me off of him, and I opened my eyes to see him running away from me. I blinked, confused, and began to cry._

Love was a whole different kind of magic, and I didn't understand it.

I remained awake all night thinking about what Albus had discovered. The more I thought about it, the more I knew that he was right. There were times when I grabbed Scorpius' hand, feeling a tingle run throughout my body. There were times when I looked at him—just _looked_ at him—and felt something that I shouldn't feel. When he had grabbed _my _hand, instead of the other way around, I was so dumbfounded that I didn't even care where he was taking me. He could have been taking me to the end of the Earth, and I probably wouldn't have noticed or cared. And when he asked if I thought we were too friendly with each other, he looked in my eyes, and I couldn't think. So, I made a joke… because we were friends, and he would joke right back. I guess it was better to be friends than nothing, though. I was in denial, anyway—again, how many times did I deny to other people that we were a couple, and truly _believe_ it? I wouldn't even second guess myself and think, _Oh, but I want to be_. I just said we weren't, and that was it. It was the truth. He didn't like me back, anyway. Looking back on the Chiromancy I learned in Divination, I remembered reading my own hand that day he wasn't there. My life line faded in the middle, meaning that my vitality of life grew weak at some point. My heart line was faded in general; I couldn't help but think that there was some sort of connection between my life line and heart line. Love could affect your health, couldn't it? The following morning, I got up early—or, earlier, I should say—to finish the schoolwork that I had put off. I got dressed in my uniform and ran a brush through my hair before doing the rest of my work, so I could go straight to breakfast if I took too long. I didn't know how, but I managed to complete all of my assignments without Scorpius interrupting my thoughts. He didn't come into my thoughts again. When I looked up from my last essay to see if I had anything else to do, I jumped violently. Lily was kneeling at the other side of the table I was working at, watching me carefully. She laughed when I jumped, but I just breathed harshly. She had taken me completely off guard—it was usually Albus who scared me in the morning, not Lily. "Hey, Rose," she said, smiling at me. I finally found it in me to smile back, after I had calmed my breathing down. She laughed again. "I just have a quick question for you. Why do you get up so early everyday just to do assignments? I mean, half of this stuff probably isn't even due until tomorrow, right?"

I shrugged. "I couldn't sleep last night. Besides, some of this stuff I actually put off. Hey, that was two questions," I replied, and Lily shook her head.

"Right," she agreed, leaning forward to get a better look of my essay. "Oh, nice stuff. _The Origin of Veritaserum_." She paused, running a hand through her soft red hair—thinner and finer than mine. "I have another question for you. What were you and Albus fighting about last night? You were loud, but I couldn't understand anything."

"Oh," I muttered, biting my lip. I hadn't thought of Scorpius since now, and I didn't really want to. "Um, lots of stupid Head Girl, Head boy stuff that you probably wouldn't be interested in. Boring grown-up stuff that you shouldn't be bothering with."

I wasn't really one to lie, but everyone had fallen under circumstances that kept them from telling the truth. This was just one of those situations for me. I couldn't keep myself from lying.

Lily, of course, didn't fall for it. She was too smart for her own good—something that my father repeatedly said of me when he thought I wasn't listening. I had heard the conversation before; Uncle Harry and my dad would be in the kitchen, and I would be in the living room next to it, minding my own business. Then, one of them would bring up their kids: "Oh, you should have seen Hugo the other day!" Eventually, my dad would say, "Rose is just too smart for her own good—kind of like Hermione."

"What do you take me for, a two-year-old? I'm fifteen; I think I can handle whatever you were fighting about, and I'm sure it wasn't Head Girl, Head Boy stuff," she snapped, placing her hands on her hips. I scowled, stalling by piling up my scrolls and placing them in my bag beside my chair. Lily was growing impatient. "I heard you say, 'His father is innocent!'"

"We were fighting about Scorpius, okay? You know everything that's been going on with the Muggle killings and the arrests," I said, and Lily nodded. "Your dad and my dad don't really like Mr. Malfoy—I'm sure they've told you the stories. Albus knows that Mr. Malfoy used to be a Death Eater, kind of, and he just thought it was dangerous for me to be Scorpius' friend right now. And then he said that I liked Scorpius as more than a friend… and I'm trying so hard to just prove that Mr. Malfoy is innocent."

Lily placed her hand on her chin and looked as though she were deep in thought. "Well, you do like him," she finally said with a smile. "Anyone with eyes can see that. And he likes you back, too. It's so funny, though, because I clearly remember that day at Platform 9 ¾, when Uncle Ron told you not to get too close to Scorpius." I blushed, amazed that she could remember that. "And as long as someone believes in Mr. Malfoy, then he could be innocent."

"He _is_ innocent," I muttered. I could hear girls laughing up in the dorms, and I became quiet. Everyone was starting to wake up, meaning that breakfast would have to be soon. Meaning that I would have to face Albus again. Meaning that I would have to face Scorpius.

"Well, as long as you believe that, it's true," she shrugged, and I looked at her, somewhat stunned. That had sounded rather insightful—something that was rare, coming from a fifteen-year-old. "By the way, Michael and I and Hugo and Janice are doubling for the next Hogsmeade trip this weekend, and Hugo was wondering if he could borrow a couple Galleons from you. He was too scared to ask you."

Then, of course, she would say that, and kill her insightful comment.

I walked down to breakfast before everyone else started down, when it was quiet and I could think. If I had loved Scorpius all along, nothing would change between us, anyway. It was just that no one had pointed it out to me before so obviously—everything was exactly the same.

Lily had said that Scorpius liked me back. He had never let on—wasn't that just more proof that everything would remain exactly the same?

When I got to the Great Hall, there were only a couple of other students there, but the food was already on the tables. Since my parents had been at Hogwarts, they had changed the rules a little bit. Students could sit wherever they'd like, meaning with any house, with the guarantee that everything would remain calm. Slytherins sat at the Gryffindor table, and Hufflepuffs would join them. Ravenclaws could sit at the Slytherin table, and so on. I noticed one particular Slytherin sitting at the Gryffindor table, all by himself.

"H-hey," I started nervously, prodding Scorpius in the back with my finger before sliding down next to him. I left enough room so that I couldn't feel him next to me at all. "This is strange. What are you doing here so early?"

He didn't respond right away. There was a piece of bread on his plate that he hadn't yet touched, and from the lack of crumbs on the rest of the plate, I could tell that he hadn't eaten anything else, either. He had just been sitting here, by himself, staring at his plate. There was obviously something wrong with him today.

"The same thing you're doing here," Scorpius replied coolly. "Eating."

I laughed, picking up his piece of toast and looking at it. "I hardly count staring at a piece of bread as eating. What are you really doing up here this early? You're usually the _last_ person to breakfast," I chuckled, but Scorpius seemed oblivious to my tiny joke. I furrowed my eyebrows and crossed my arms. "We already had that talk about how you can tell me anything… Do you really want me to go over it again?"

Scorpius' eyes widened, and he shook his head. "No, not really," he said, sitting up taller on the bench. I smiled. "You know how I don't usually dream? I mean, I've lied about most of my entrees into our dream journals. But last night I had a dream about the Aurors coming to my house and taking my dad away. Don't you think there's something wrong, here? First you had a dream, and now I did? I never dream."

I had to admit, it was a little odd that Scorpius had a dream. But he had been thinking about his father all day; it was only natural that he would have a dream about something like that. He was just worried—and obviously tired, if he slept so soundly that he had a dream. There was nothing to worry about!

"You're just worried about him. It's normal to have dreams or nightmares when you're stressed. It happens to me all the time," I shrugged, and he looked over at me—seeming slightly incredulous—for the first time since I sat down.

"You _always_ dream. Because you're _always_ stressed," he snapped, and I was taken aback. I wasn't always stressed. Just sometimes. "I've been stressed before, and have I ever dreamed about my father being arrested? No. There seems to be a trend going on here, and I think it's only a matter of days before something bad happens."

"You're scared for him?" I asked, although it was more of a statement than a question. He was frightened—absolutely terrified—of what was going to happen to his father. It was genuine, too. It wasn't just that if his father was arrested, he wouldn't be as popular anymore, or that he would be treated differently. It was that he was just a son scared for his father.

"Scorpius," I sighed. "He'll be fine. I promise. As long as you and I believe that he's innocent, then he is."

He smiled at me, looking somewhat confused. "That was surprisingly insightful. I didn't know you were capable of being so sensitive," he said seriously, although I knew—at least, I hoped I knew—he was joking with me.

"Yeah, well… Lily told me that, first," I admitted, and he laughed. I felt something warm touch my hand. Scorpius slipped his hand into mine, entwining our fingers under the table. A shock ran throughout my body, and I could feel myself begin to blush. Scorpius didn't seem to notice.

"I appreciate it more coming from you, Rosie," he whispered, and I could feel myself getting even redder.

By this time, everyone was filing into the Great Hall at an alarming rate. I started to pull my hand away—thinking that Scorpius would want me to—but he tightened his grip on my hand. I looked at him, startled.

"Don't," he said, looking right in my eyes. So, we sat at the table as everyone else settled in around us, still holding hands.

--

**Author's Note:** Okay, okay. Don't yell at me, please. I've been gone for a little less than six months (pathetic, I know). To be completely honest, I thought I had given up on fanfiction forever, other than beta reading. I basically have, actually. I just came on here the other day and starting reading my own fanfiction—just to see how it was. Then, I felt bad for not finishing this. So, here I am.

Yeah, six months, I know. I'm bad. Sorry. That's, like, the ultimate wait for a chapter.

Anyway, I like the beginning of this chapter. I just think that would be so cute if it actually happened in real life! I'm sure someone somewhere has kissed someone because of a fairy tale. I just think that's so cute—and kind of depressing, considering that Jeremy had run away from Rose.

Seriously, though! Didn't it always seem like the princesses would fall in love with their princes in, like, two minutes? Look at _Enchanted_ (which totally happens to be the best Disney movie of this decade)—Robert was so flabbergasted when Giselle said she was in love with Edward after a day. (Literally, this is what happened: Giselle fell from a tree and landed in Edward's lap—who went to find her because of her voice—he asked what her name was, and then declared that they were to be married in the morning. Yeah, that so doesn't happen. Ever). I just don't believe in love at first sight…

Okay, I've talked enough. Leave reviews! Yell at me for being so slow with updates! Talk about _Enchanted_! Just leave a review!


	8. Twenty Questions

**Chapter Eight – Twenty Questions**

When Scorpius asked me to skip class with him after breakfast, my immediate response was no. I had never skipped a class in my life, and I didn't plan to start now—especially while I was still Head Girl and could be stripped of my position. But he thrust his lower lip out in a puppy-face position, and I couldn't stop myself from agreeing to skip class. I was pathetic. I was stupid. I was going to fail Defense Against the Dark Arts.

Still holding my hand, we walked casually out of the Great Hall with some other students (who snickered behind our backs, literally, when they looked down at our hands) before turning left instead of right to head outside. Scorpius had skipped class out here before, and he had never been caught, strangely enough. I hadn't even noticed him after class until I tripped over him. We were safe.

I couldn't keep myself from shivering nervously, however. Scorpius only seemed to notice after we sat down by the edge of the lake, when he glanced over at me. He burst out laughing, smiling at me when he finished. I glared at him; he was just _so_ caring, what could I say?

"What? Nervous, are we?" he sneered, finally letting go of my hand, but only to push me lightly. I scowled, crossing my arms across my chest. He rolled his eyes and sighed. "I never get in trouble—_you_ could get me in trouble right now, though, considering you're Head Girl. Are you going to take points from Slytherin? Insure that Gryffindor wins the House Cup?"

I smiled, my nervousness slowly going away. "Well, if I took points from Slytherin, I'd have to take away points from Gryffindor, as well, wouldn't I? I'm a fair Head Girl," I said, and he rolled his eyes again. "If you were Head Boy, I would doubt that you would be fair. You'd take points from people just for breathing in your precious air. Anyway… if I took points from Slytherin and Gryffindor, Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff could win House Cup. We don't want that."

Scorpius laughed again. "Oh, so you're a fair Head Girl?" he joked, and I laughed along with him.

"Eh, that's what Albus is there for. He can be the fair one while I can just be the lazy one who skips class," I shrugged, reaching down to unbuckle my shoes and take off my socks. There was something comforting about the way the water felt around my legs when I just waved them around in the lake. The water wasn't as cold today as it had been—perhaps because it was finally getting to be nice out.

"Good old Albus," Scorpius said slowly, watching me swirl my legs around in the water. "What is he up to these days? I haven't talked to him in a while—which is strange, since we sit at the same table for breakfast and occasionally lunch or dinner. Is he avoiding me or something?"

I knew Scorpius was joking when he asked if Albus was avoiding him. He just didn't know that he could be right. Sure, Albus and Scorpius weren't exactly friends, but they still talked once in a while—mostly about Quidditch, and how some team was going to win the World Cup (something that I had no interest in). It wasn't like Albus to shun people; this thing was getting out of control.

"He's just been busy, I guess," I lied, shrugging and looking away. I knew that didn't really explain why Albus wasn't talking to Scorpius while they were at the same table, but it was the best lie I could come up with. Scorpius didn't question it. He just furrowed his eyebrows and shrugged. That was good enough for me.

"So," he started, after a sudden silence had rose over us. "There's a Hogsmeade trip this weekend, right? I'm going to assume that you're going." I nodded slowly, grinning lamely. He nodded with me, awkwardly. "Is your uncle ever going to open another Weasley's Wizard Wheezes at Hogsmeade. That would be wonderful, you know."

I smiled, shaking my head. "Probably not anytime soon. My cousin, Fred, may take over the shop when Uncle George gets too old, but I don't think anyone would have enough effort to open another shop. My dad would have to start working there again if they wanted a second shop, and I'm pretty sure he's had enough of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes to last a lifetime."

"I'm surprised George hasn't," Scorpius said. "It's a good business, though. I ordered stuff the other day, actually. Something new… I'm not sure what it is, yet."

I rolled my eyes. "Okay, seriously, I've told you a thousand times, I get a free copy of everything in the store when it comes out," I reminded him, and he lowered his eyebrows. "You have the worst memory of anyone I've met. I get free copies of the stuff? Free? I don't want it? Does any of that ring a bell?"

"No, not really. But I don't want to take your stuff. You may want it sometime in the future," he replied.

"Probably not."

There was another long silence, the only sound coming from the water lapping when I kicked my legs around. There was no breeze, no calls from any birds. Everything was silent, and for a moment, it was deafening. Then, I thought it was beautiful. When was it ever completely silent like this? It was peaceful, and I smiled.

"Do you want to play a game?" Scorpius asked, being the one to break the silence again. I shrugged, and he took that for a yes. It was fine with me—I had liked the silence, but playing a game would be okay, too. Whatever it was, I wanted to win; that usually wasn't the case. Scorpius beat me at most games we played (thumb war, anyone?), but I was the smarter one. It didn't matter if I failed at things like that.

"Okay, this is called Twenty Questions. I think of something—"

"—and I ask twenty questions about it to try to figure out what it is. I used to play it all the time when I was younger. As in, five years old, younger," I sneered, and Scorpius pushed me gently again. "I'm just saying. Anyway, I'm pretty good at this game, so this shouldn't take long. I'm guessing ten questions, tops."

"Ah, but you doubt my ability to think up something good for you to figure out. I mean, when you were five, people probably thought of things like an owl or a cat. You're seventeen now; this is going to be a lot harder," Scorpius said with a smirk. I bit my lip—because he was right. Most of the time, it was a cat or an owl that people were thinking of.

"Fine,' I said anyway. "You have one?" He nodded, and I smiled. "Good. Count for me, will you? Is it an animal?"

"Yes," he replied with a smirk. "But it's not a cat or an owl."

I glared at him, shaking my head angrily. I wasn't stupid. I was going to figure it out as fast as I could. I mean, Scorpius wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed; he would pick something that I had at least heard of—something obvious, I was sure, that he would think I'd never get because it was _too_ obvious. That was how he played games. This would be easy.

"Is it a mammal?" I asked next.

He nodded. "Yeah."

The game continued. So far, I had learned that it was bigger than a breadbox, sometimes colorful, and not a chameleon (because they were supposedly "smaller than breadboxes"). I was on my sixth question, and seriously, so far, I didn't really know anything. If I was going to figure out what it was soon, I would have to start asking better questions.

"Is it bigger than a tiger?" I asked next—then, I realized that it really wasn't that good a question. Scorpius gave me an incredulous look and shook his head. I could read his face: _Bigger than a tiger? That was random—are you sure you're good at this game?_

"All right, all right. Can it be domestic?"

"Kind of," he replied, scrunching his face up.

"Are you sure it isn't an owl?" I asked, then slapped a hand to my face. An owl wasn't a mammal. Scorpius smiled before bursting out laughing. I scowled, and he rolled his eyes at me. I was definitely proving myself poorly to him. He probably thought I was the worst person to ever play this game. "Right. Is it a creature only known to Muggles?" Scorpius shook his head. "Is it a hippogriff."

He furrowed his eyebrows. "You're terrible at this game. Hippogriffs are half birds. Oh, and let me clarify this, too: Griffons are _also_ half birds, so don't try to guess those next," he joked. I splashed some water at him angrily.

"They're half mammal, too, you know!" I retorted, crossing my arms again. "Are you sure it's not a cat, then?" I paused. That was a waste of a question—Scorpius didn't even bother to answer it. "Is it a dragon?"

He coughed sarcastically. "Rosie… you are so bad at this game! Dragons aren't mammals—and they're bigger than tigers, as well. That was the biggest mess up I have ever heard in this game."

"Darn," I muttered. "I knew that. Well, is it violent?"

"Not _violent_, per say."

I had already passed ten questions—that had been my twelfth. If I planned on getting it right, I only had eight more questions left, and one of those had to be a correct guess. Maybe Scorpius was smarter than I gave him credit for; maybe he could think of something that I really wouldn't get. Maybe he wasn't being obvious because he knew that I'd assume that he would be obvious. He was being tricky!

"Short-tempered?" I offered, and he smiled.

"Yeah, perfect. By the way, I'm counting that as one of your questions," he said with a smile. I narrowed my eyes. Granted, I probably would have counted that to, if we had been playing the other way around.

"Jerk," I snapped anyway. "Are you sure it's not a hippogriff?"

He rolled his eyes. "Yes. I'm counting that, too. Oh, and hippogriffs are bigger than tigers, I think, too. So, that's another one that you guessed that was awful. And you guessed it twice—even worse."

"How rude!" I was doing awful. This would be my fifteenth question, and I still didn't know anything about whatever he was thinking about. Only that it was colorful, bigger than a breadbox but smaller than a tiger, and short-tempered… that sounded like a Dementor! "How about a Dementor? That has to be it.."

He paused before answering, looking deeply troubled. "Are they mammals?"

"Well, that's obviously not it," I murmured to myself. "And they aren't colorful. How about a human? They can be colorful, and all that other stuff that I've figured out. And both Muggles and wizards know about them." Scorpius smiled, and I grew excited. I was right! Oh my goodness, I was right!

"Be more specific."

I frowned, letting my shoulders sag depressingly. "Boy, you're making this tough on me, aren't you? If you count that as a question, I'll hex you," I barked, and I meant it. Scorpius only laughed. "Please don't say that it's Harry Potter. That would just kill me."

"Nope," he chuckled. "But I could change it to that if you'd like."

I glared at him again. "That's mean," I said angrily. "Not my parents either, right?"

"No," he sighed.

"Your dad?"

"You do know that you only have one guess left, right?"

"Dumbledore!"

Scorpius stared at me, shaking his head slowly. I sighed. I was so close to figuring it out. If I had one more guess, I would have gotten it right. It had to be Albus. We were just talking about him, after all. Like I said, it was so obvious that it was difficult. That _had _to be the answer. I mean, come on—there were thousands of people I knew. How specific could I get?

"It's a girl…" Scorpius trailed off, biting his lip and looking at me expectantly.

Oh, well, then it wasn't Albus. "Your mom?"

Scorpius sighed. "You are so awful at this game. I'm never playing it with you again. It's a girl who's colorful, bigger than a breadbox but smaller than a tiger, short-tempered, known to both Muggles and wizards…" he trailed off again, but I just stared at him, gaping. I could describe lots of girls like that. "Oh, come _on_, Rose. She's pretty, too. Ringing a bell?"

I shook my head, and he rolled his eyes. "You!" he exclaimed, and I raised an eyebrow.

"Me?"

"Yes, you! I can't believe you couldn't get _yourself_ in twenty questions!" he laughed, but I was still taken aback. And when he put it like that, it definitely sounded like I was the dumbest girl on the planet.

"Me?" I repeated stupidly.

"Rosie," he said, shaking his head. My mouth slowly formed a smile, and Scorpius smiled back at me. "If someone was describing you to me, I would have gotten you on the first guess."

--

**Author's Note:** Ha ha, I told you I would update quickly! Actually, wait, did I say that? Well, if I didn't, then just pretend I did. Because I did update quickly. I'm quite proud of myself.

This chapter looked a lot better in my head, though. And it was a lot funnier. I remember just writing it down in numbers, like so:

1. Is it an animal? Yes

2. Is it a mammal? Yes

It was just so much funnier when she got to the stupid stuff. I just laughed while she was asking the questions and I had to write them down. They were just stupid. It was like something I'd do, though, just better. I don't know. It was funny in my head/on paper.

Anyway, I only got a couple of reviews for the last chapter, and I need more! I want to know what you guys think. I don't care if you hate it or if you're too lazy to write a review—leave one, anyway! It can be one word! I don't really care. I just want to know what you think, and if I need to change anything. Because, trust me, it's not perfect. You need to help me! After all, you are the ones reading it.

Thanks!


	9. Energy Bars

**Chapter Nine – Energy Bars**

I had always hated patrolling the hallways at night. Being a teenage girl, I thrived on the sleep I received. To be honest, it was hard for me to focus on anything at all when I had less than eight hours of sleep. Supposedly, that was the recommended amount all teenagers were to get each night if they wanted to function correctly during the day. That seemed to prove true whenever I got less than eight hours of sleep.

Of course, with my luck, I had to patrol the hallways the night after I had gotten no sleep—the same night of the day I skipped class with Scorpius. I had not been able to stop thinking about the Twenty Questions game—he had picked _me_. He had picked me, little old Rose Weasley, for his subject! I mean, that had to mean _something_, right?

Still, by my third class—I had resumed going to class after the first class ended—I was dead, a walking zombie. I could barely hold my eyes open. Albus had informed me after my second class that he was sick and wouldn't be able to patrol the hallways with me, which left me alone. I spent the little time I had before Divination trying to track down all of the Prefects. All of them said they couldn't for the same reason: they had a test the next morning. Somehow, I highly doubted that.

I sulked into Divination, tired and frustrated. I could not believe that Albus had done this to me. He had been absolutely fine the night before! He was going to be so dead when I got through with him later. At least if I couldn't find another person to take over for him.

When Scorpius enter the room and sat down at our table, my eyes lit up. Scorpius had never been a prefect, as he was one of the students that I constantly caught—and let off—skipping class (something I was sure the professors knew). But that didn't mean he wasn't Prefect material; he would have been honest and fair as a Prefect, despite what he was trying to convince me of otherwise. In fact, he probably could have before Head Boy, were it not for his constant absence from class.

Still, when I asked him to take Albus' place for one night—mentioning tiredly how much it would mean to me (and conveniently forgetting to mention that this was technically not allowed to ask him to take over since he wasn't a Prefect)—he laughed in my face. I was too tired to supply another reason why he should do it, so I just gave him a pleading face. He shook his head.

"Scorpius," I sighed, laying my head down on the table and closing my eyes. "I'm tired, and I really can't patrol the hallways by myself. I've asked all the Prefects, and they all told me no." I was on the verge of tears now—something that happened _a lot_ when I was tired. I sat up and stared at him accusingly (finding it a lot more difficult to open my eyes back up than it should have been), letting him take in my sad eyes. "I skipped class for you!"

He looked alarmed when he saw the tears welling up in my eyes. He patted my shoulder awkwardly and bit his lip. "Well, I suppose I could help you this one time," he agreed. I sighed again, this time in relief, and leaned across the table to kiss him on the cheek. He turned redder than my hair.

"You're a lifesaver, you know. Thank you so much!" I exclaimed gratefully. Scorpius grinned in reply, his face still burning red.

I managed to get Albus to give me his Head Boy badge, but only after I convinced him that Scorpius wouldn't lose it and that I wouldn't get caught. To be honest, he really _didn't_ look sick. I wondered what could possibly wrong with him. At least he had gotten sleep last night! He looked fine—and I was positive he knew that, since after he gave me his badge, he went up to his dormitory really quickly.

Dinner was over, and all of the classes were done. Everyone should have been in their Houses now, but I was going to give them a little more time. In my dormitory, I was searching frantically for something to wake me up. I could always use a spell, like spraying myself with water. But that would be too cold and wet—of course, then, I could just use a drying spell… and be nice and warm and tired again.

I found a stash of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes stuff from Uncle George under my bed (because we weren't really supposed to have it). Uncle George made everything; there had to be something that would wake me up long enough to last at least a couple of hours. A blow horn that blew whenever I felt like closing my eyes for a minute, maybe?

No! It was perfect: an energy bar of sorts ("To make all-nighters a breeze"). I didn't really care what could possibly in it at that moment—an energy bar was an energy bar, right? Typically, I didn't trust Uncle George's cooking, but maybe Fred had made it. That would be okay. I could trust my own cousin's cooking.

I ripped the bar's wrapping off and looked at it. It looked like a normal energy bar. And when I bit into it, it tasted like a regular energy bad. Maybe Uncle George was being spontaneous and decided to send me an energy bar—maybe it wasn't from his shop, after all.

Except for the fact that it seemed to work almost immediately. I suddenly felt perkier (a _lot_ perkier, actually)—and a lot less tired. It was an amazing feeling; I was going to have to order some more of those things from the shop (and probably make Uncle George die of shock, considering I never order anything from him).

It was probably time to start doing rounds now—on the grounds, at least, where I had told Scorpius to meet me. By the time we finished making sure no one was sneaking off to Hagrid's (Albus, perhaps?), everyone would be in their dormitories, anyway. At least, I really hoped they would be, so my job would be easier.

When I went out to the grounds, carrying the Head Boy badge that I had taken from Albus for Scorpius, Scorpius was already out there. It was nearly pitch black outside, but I could tell from a mile away that he was annoyed with me.

"Hello!" I exclaimed enthusiastically, thrusting the badge into his hand when I was close enough. He jumped, clearly not expecting it. "Just hold onto that. If one of the professors find you, show them that and tell them to come find me, since, technically, you aren't supposed to be doing this. If you find any students, just send them back to their appropriate House. You can't take points. I don't usually, anyway, but I'm just mentioning that you aren't _actually_ Head Boy. Okay?"

Scorpius stared at me, wide-eyed and gaping "Wow, I didn't understand anything you just said, you said it so fast. I thought you said earlier that you were tired. You don't really seem it," he said incredulously, continuing to stare at me in disbelief.

"I am!" I replied, a little too loudly. "I mean, I was. I ate an energy bar, and it is _wonderful_. Really, it's brilliant."

"Not from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes?" he asked, his expression changing from skepticism to anger. I nodded, smiling happily at him. He rubbed his temples slowly before replying again. "Oh, for the love of Merlin, that's just great. I don't think we should really split up for rounds now—"

"Why not?" I demanded, and Scorpius winced.

"_That's_ why. You're screaming at me," he pointed out. That was ridiculous! I wasn't screaming at anyone. What was he talking about? "Basically, they make your emotions go on the blitz. You become angry very easily, and when you aren't angry, you're really happy. And you become extremely loud and obnoxious. If we separate for our rounds, you might wake people up with your screaming."

"No, I won't!" I yelled, crossing my arms and glaring at him.

"Rosie, be quiet!" he hissed in a whisper. He walked toward me, looking carefully from side to side, and covered my mouth with a hand very gently. I was infuriated! How dare he tell me to be quiet? I opened my mouth and bit down on one of his fingers. He howled in pain, pulling his hand back and cradling it in his other hand. "Damn, Rose! Did you just bite me?"

Well, I felt much better. I began to laugh, snorting every once in a while. Scorpius closed his eyes and exhaled slowly. His nostrils flared when he did that! It was hilarious!

"One of your uncle's worst products," he muttered, wiping his hand on his pants. "Listen, I already checked around out here while I was waiting for you. Why don't we just skip rounds for tonight, so you can go to—"

"I'll start inside!" I declared, turning around and skipping back inside. I couldn't remember the last time I actually _skipped_. It was so much fun! I loved the way my hair flew up as I went down. It was so magical!

I continued to skip throughout the halls until I came upon two students from Gryffindor sneaking around. It was a boy and a girl—third years, perhaps—sitting up against the walls. They obviously thought they were well hidden—or they at least thought that they wouldn't get caught—since they were just sitting there talking casually.

"Hey! Go back up to the Tower! What do you think you're doing up after hours?" I demanded, my face crinkling in anger. They so naturally assumed that they wouldn't get in trouble, I was sure! How dare they? "One hundred points from Gryffindor! And don't you think that you've gotten away easily for this! I'll be telling Professor Longbottom!"

The two students looked absolutely frightened, as they scrambled to their feet. I, personally, couldn't imagine why, though. I was being perfectly reasonable. Telling Professor Longbottom _was_ letting them off easily, even though I told them otherwise.

"Rosie!" Scorpius exclaimed, coming up behind me. "You do realize that that's your own house, correct?" He looked at the two Gryffindors apologetically. "I'm really sorry. She's a little loopy right now. Just go one back to the Tower and I'll reason with her, okay? Seriously, I'm sorry about this."

They turned around and ran, but I wasn't done with them, yet. "One thousand points from Gryffindor for running in the halls!" I shrieked, and I saw Scorpius smack a hand to his face out of the corner of my eye. I turned to face him, pointing a finger in his face. "Why are you here? You are supposed to be looking around for other students somewhere else, not following me around!"

"You're insane if you thought I was going to let you walk around by yourself—I even told you that! Oh, but you're crazy, anyway, so it doesn't matter what you thought," he snapped, and I glared at him. "You know what? Why don't we just sit down for a minute or two and just relax? You need to get this energy bar out of your system."

I nodded, and the two of us took a seat up against the hard stonewall where the two students I caught had once been. I didn't know why Scorpius was making such a big deal about this energy bar. I was perfectly sane.

"Oh, Rosie, you are a piece of work," Scorpius murmured. I burst out laughing again when I looked at him. He looked exhausted, and honest, a little annoying. Still, at the same time, he was beautiful.

"Hey, Scorpius?" I asked, biting my lip in order to stop laughing. "I love you."

He sighed, closing his eyes and resting his head against the cold wall. "That's nice, Rose," he replied coolly. "Do I know any spells to counteract this thing? It's no use asking you."

I laughed again. "No, Scorpius, I'm _serious_. I really do love you," I repeated. He opened his eyes and lifted his head to stare at me. I just smiled at him, trying to fight back another laugh.

He came towards me, pushing his lips against mine with a wonderful force. I moved my body closer to his, molding myself to his warm form. One of my hands laid on his chest, feeling the warm fabric of his sweater, and the other was finding its way through his soft blonde hair; both of his hands laid on my hips, and I knew he was using quite a bit of force to keep himself from moving them.

The kiss seemed to last forever, but it ended too soon. His lips left mine, vehemently, as if it took much of his strength to pull away. We stared at each other for a moment, trying to figure out what we had just done. I snorted, laughing so uncontrollably that my eyes began to water. Scorpius' head fell into his hands, as he detached himself from my embrace.

"What did I just do? You're completely out of it. You have no idea what you're doing," he muttered, and I laughed louder, snorting every few seconds now.

"No," I said, smiling widely. "I'm just _really_ happy."

Scorpius' eye searched mine, and after a moment, he kissed me again. I realized something this time—something that I hadn't realized before: I knew exactly what all of those princesses felt like when their princes kissed them.

--

**Author's Note:** Aha! They have finally kissed! I wasn't that happy with this chapter, like, the beginning and stuff, but I loved the last line. And I loved Scorpius, too, but that's beside the point.

I knew exactly how Rose felt at the beginning of the chapter. I got no sleep the night before I wrote this chapter (it must show, even though I edited it before I typed it up), and I just wanted to close my eyes and fall asleep forever. It was awful. Now, though, I am completely refreshed! Yay! Although, I'm not extremely hyper/angry.

Anyway, making Rose act like that was kind of fun. She was so annoying, and it was just wonderful! Scorpius was still so nice to her…

Yeah… so, happy reading! I hope you liked it! Thanks so much for reading so far, and _leave reviews_!

Thanks! I'll update soon!


	10. Passing Notes

**Chapter Ten – Passing Notes**

I was late. I overslept, and I was late. No one had even bothered to wake me? _Lunch_ was going to start soon, and I had just waked up. I had missed two of my classes (that had been the second day in a row for Potions). I was going to be in so much trouble with the professor. The stuff I missed was bound to show up on the N.E.W.Ts.

Of course, I would happily go back to sleep if I knew I could relive the dream I had been having. Everything was so surreal in it, so unbelievable. At one point, I even tried to take one thousand one hundred points from Gryffindor, and I snorted when I laughed after eating some energy bar from Uncle George (ha! Like that would ever happen). The best thing was that I got to kiss Scorpius—no, actually, _he_ kissed _me_.

Yeah, it was kind of unbelievable. First of all, I would never eat anything Uncle George gave me. Secondly, why would I take over a thousand points from my own house? And, thirdly, Scorpius would never kiss me. As great as it was in my dream, I knew that it would never happen. Which was all right with me, so long as I _could_ dream.

Speaking of dreaming, I basically had to sprint to Divination. I was already late, but I needn't take my time. By the time I reached the classroom, I had already missed over half the class. We would be dismissed for lunch soon.

"We've been expecting you, Miss Weasley. I'm glad you could join us," Professor Firenze said as I sat down next to Scorpius, my face burning up. I highly doubted that the class had been expecting me. Maybe the professor had been expecting me, but I was pretty sure that no one else could foresee that I was going to show up.

A piece of parchment slipped under my fingers, and I looked up at Scorpius; he was looking away from me. I opened the folded parchment and looked at the messy scrawl on it.

_Are you feeling any better, Rosie? You didn't eat another one of those energy bars, did you?_ it read. I furrowed my eyebrows and wrote down a reply on the same sheet of parchment.

_What are you talking about_?

I slid the parchment across the table as silently as I could, so as not to attract the attention of the professor. Without turning around, Scorpius reached back to grab it (although it took a couple of tries to actually find it). Within seconds, it was back on my side of the table, and it had another answer written down on it beneath mine.

Last night, remember? You ate an energy bar from your uncle's shop and basically went crazy. You wanted to take one thousand points from Gryffindor for seeing two students run in the hallways. Or did you forget? Oh, by the way, I checked for you, and the points were never taken from your house.

Wait a minute. That actually _happened_? It wasn't a dream? Oh, those poor kids were probably scared to death of me, and I never had considered myself someone to be afraid of. Most students liked me as a Head Girl, or so I had been told. Now, they probably told everyone that I was a nutcase. Which I suppose I was last night. What had I been thinking, eating something from Uncle George's shop? Or eating something that Uncle George cooked by himself in general?

Wait another minute. Did that mean that I actually _kissed_ Scorpius? That he actually kissed me? Holy mother of Merlin!

_Oh, right_, I wrote down, anyway. I would bring it up, all right. How could he have not said anything to me in the note earlier? How could he just ignore it like it never happened—at least I thought I dreamed it. _Yes, I'm feeling much better, thank you very much. Except, I can't seem to remember much of anything after we kissed. Or did __you__ forget? Because you aren't looking at me, which obviously means something is wrong._

I shoved the paper back at him, expecting him to turn around and look at me when he finished reading it—or at least glance my way. I had no suck luck with that. He just wrote down another reply and passed it back to me.

I'm trying to look interested in what Professor Firenze is saying, unlike you, I'm sure. I'm surprised he hasn't caught us yet. You're completely awful at passing notes.

_You're avoiding the subject,_ I replied angrily. He was definitely avoiding it. I knew what was going on here. He was embarrassed; it was a mistake. He didn't mean to kiss me. Unfortunately, I probably would have to go back to dreaming about kissing him instead. I couldn't believe it.

_No, I'm not_, he answered.

Yes, you are. Now stop. I know you kissed me. You know you kissed me.

Oh, come on, Rosie. If you can't remember anything after that, isn't it obvious that you weren't entirely there last night? Rose, I'm sorry, but I think I messed up big time. I'd appreciate it if you would forgive me. I shouldn't have taken advantage of you like that.

No, he couldn't possibly feel that way. He hadn't taken advantage of me. I mean, if I remembered correctly, I was the one who had said that I loved him—which was true enough. He had done nothing wrong. And, personally, I _liked_ kissing him. A lot. I had never felt that way before about anyone; he couldn't think that I needed to forgive him.

_Do you really think it was a mistake, Scorpius?_ I asked, sliding the parchment back over to him. He grabbed it, and for the first time today, he looked back at me. His eyes caught mine, and for a moment, he just stared at me, wide-eyed. Then, he spun back around and wrote down an answer. This one took a while, and I wondered what he could possibly be writing. It fluttered back in my direction, and I picked it up. I was surprised to find only a one-word response from him:

No.

My heart melted inside my chest, and my stomach was instantly filled with a million butterflies. That one word—the one word that he apparently had to think about a lot, since he took so long to write it down—made my entire body be filled with joy. He didn't think it was mistake—he had actually wanted to kiss me! He meant it!

Good, I wrote back, because I don't think it was a mistake, either. I was saner than you thought.

Scorpius looked back at me and smiled when he finished reading my reply. He didn't write anything back this time; class was almost over, anyway. Instead, he took the parchment and placed it in his folder for this class. I almost wanted to keep it, too, since I knew that was what he would do with it. It would forever stay in that folder as proof of what happened.

A few minutes later, class ended, and lunch would be served downstairs in the Great Hall. Everyone filed out of the classroom, and Professor Firenze went into his office. Scorpius and I were the only ones left, standing awkwardly together by the ladder. I put a hand on the side of my face and giggled once, before biting my lip to stifle it.

"Are you sure you didn't have another energy bar?" Scorpius asked, and I nodded, a smile plastered on my face. "You can go down first."

I held my book bag tight to my side and started down the ladder, but Scorpius tugged on my sleeve. I paused and sat on the edge of the floor to look at him (because I probably would have fallen if I hadn't). He took my bag from me—the first time he ever had—and I stared at him incredulously. He was being very polite. Normally, he would have gone down the ladder first, and normally, he wouldn't have taken my bag for me as I went down the ladder.

"Who are you and what have you done with Scorpius Malfoy?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows. He smiled and chuckled.

"Well, if we're going to be together, I figured that I might as well start acting gentlemanly and boyfriend-ish to you," he shrugged, and I bit my lip again—this time to keep myself from screaming out excitedly. He had just said we were together! As in boyfriend and girlfriend together! I could just die. Seriously, I was going to be the target of envy from every girl in the entire school now. Now, if someone asked if Scorpius and I were going out, I could actually say that we were!

"Okay," I managed to say, smiling widely. I climbed down the ladder, and watched as Scorpius attempted to get down carrying my bag and his own. After maybe a minute of laughing at him, I finally decided to relieve him of embarrassment. I grabbed my bag and his from him, and he jumped down the rest of the way. "That was really pathetic. Oh, wait, do I have to be nice to you now?" I paused, thinking of a way to say that it was pathetic while being nice. "That was really… no, that was just pathetic."

He looked annoyed at me, then realizing that he probably should have been, he smiled. "Thanks, Rosie," he said sarcastically. Then, he blinked and tried again. "Wait… no, thank you, Rosie."

"This isn't working," I decided, and he nodded. "Okay, even though we're together, I think we should just go on like we're just friends. Maybe like friends with benefits, but we can actually be together… Hold on, am I confusing you?" Scorpius was looking at me strangely, so I assumed that I was definitely confusing him. "Just act normally."

"Right," he agreed, taking his bag back from me. "No being nice to each other."

I rolled my eyes. "Now, I didn't say that. You can still carry all my stuff if you really want to," I sneered, and Scorpius shook his head. "Fine, then. We'll just act normally."

"No more energy bars," he reminded me, and I laughed. That wouldn't really be a problem anymore. I never planned on having one of those again. Although, they had been beneficial. I made it through my shift without falling asleep—at least, I thought so (since I still couldn't remember anything after Scorpius kissed me)—and it brought Scorpius and I together. I thought it worked out pretty well. "Speaking of that, now that you're… let's say, sobered up…"

He came closer to me and placed his mouth over mine. I melted in his arms, and he tightened his grip around me before lifting me off the ground. I squealed, pulling away from him for only a moment until he put me back on the ground. My arms were wrapped around his neck, playing with the hair that reached down that far.

Scorpius pulled his lips away from mine and formed a smile with them. "Yeah, that was a little better," he admitted, and I smiled weakly back at him. "Don't get me wrong, it was pretty good yesterday—you're just… entirely here today, whereas yesterday, you were kind of loopy…"

"Oh, thanks," I said, rolling my eyes. I couldn't really compare any of the kissing because it was all really wonderful. I mean, yesterday was amazing, even though I thought it was a dream first, and today was just as amazing. It was as if all of the nerves in my body were affected by his kissing, like my entire body was under his control. It was a strange, but wonderful, feeling.

Of course, he probably had kissed a lot of girls in his time here at Hogwarts, whereas he was the second boy I had ever kissed (or the first, if I didn't include Jeremy when I was eight). Speaking of Jeremy, I had never told Scorpius about that—he would probably make fun of me forever. It was probably a better idea that I didn't tell him about that.

"We have to go to lunch," Scorpius said next, probably realizing that he was actually hungry. As if on cue, my stomach growled, and I remembered that I hadn't yet had any food. "Meaning that we have to face everyone, since we'll probably be the last one's there, and everyone will wonder where we've been. We have to tell them, you know. Albus won't be happy, will he?"

Right. I had forgotten about everyone else. Oh, Lily and her boyfriend would probably be happy for me. It was Hugo and Albus I was worried about. First of all, I wasn't entirely sure I wanted my parents to know that I was going out with Scorpius quite yet—especially with this whole thing with Mr. Malfoy going on right now. And Hugo was bound to tell them if he knew.

Then, there was the problem child: Albus. My over-protector. I loved Albus, really, but this was one thing that I would resent him for if he complained. He had no right to whine. I knew he just wanted me to be safe, but Scorpius wasn't a problem. He wouldn't hurt me. Albus was going to have to get that through his thick skull. There was no problem here.

"Albus will be fine," I replied, sighing loudly. "If he puts up a fuss, I'll kill him."

"He's seventeen. If he puts up a fuss, I'll make sure he's sent back to first year," Scorpius muttered, and I couldn't help but to laugh. "Seriously, he has no say in who you go out with. Speaking of that, do you want to go to Hogsmeade together?"

"We would have gone together, anyway," I reminded him, and he shrugged.

"Details."

"Fine," I agreed, looking down the hall. Better now or never if I ever wanted to eat—and face everyone at the same time. "Shall we?" I held out my hand, and Scorpius grabbed it without another thought, something he wouldn't have done before. I smiled at this, but he didn't seem to notice.

So, walking hand in hand, we started for the Great Hall to face our impending doom.

--

**Author's Note:** Howdy! Get ready for the impending doom in the next chapter—which also happens to be its title. I think. If I remember, which I might not. I'm bad with things like that. Anyway, impending doom is coming up soon.

Anyway, wasn't it weird for Scorpius to, like, offer to take her bag and stuff? Seriously, if I was Rose, I would have been really creeped out. I'm just glad they're going to act normally around each other. Except for the making out and stuff. But, like Scorpius said, those are just details. Who needs them? Well, I'm a writer, so I do. But that isn't the point.

Who's hoping that Albus puts up a fuss about Rose and Scorpius? Anyone? To be honest, I am. Not saying that will happen or anything…

Anyway, review! Say what you think! Tell me if you think Albus will put up a fight! Anything! I just need more reviews!

Thanks everyone!


	11. Impending Doom

**Chapter Eleven – Impending Doom**

It felt as though the entire Great Hall became silent as Scorpius and I walked into the room holding hands. The eyes of the Slytherins and Gryffindors bore into us like needles, and the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs just looked because everyone else was; even the teachers seemed to be watching us expectantly. I wanted to yank my hand away from Scorpius' and run away—but I couldn't be a coward. I always finished what I started, and leaving Scorpius like that would be mean.

"My family and friends or your friends first?" I asked Scorpius in a whisper (although it seemed to echo throughout the room like a scream), trying to move my lips as little as possible. I glanced over at my family, all of whom carried mixed expressions. Lily looked absolutely ecstatic—it probably took everything in her power to keep her from jumping out of her seat. Hugo looked like he could care less, although that was usually what he looked like, anyway. And Albus… oh, dear Albus… his eyes were narrowed, and he looked angry. Of course, as soon as we would go talk to them, he'd probably put on an act.

"_Definitely_ your family first. After dealing with them—er, Albus—talking to my friends should be a piece of cake. Well, to be honest, my friends probably won't even care. But your family kind of holds a grudge against my family, and they're kind of…" Scorpius trailed off, looking at me apologetically. "Sorry, but your family really is very… opinionated."

I shrugged, not really bothered by the true statement. I mean, we _did_ hold a bit of a grudge. At least, my dad did—my mum didn't really care. She would probably bring Mr. Malfoy pumpkin pasties if my dad let her (well, maybe not pumpkin pasties—she wasn't very good at cooking those). Everyone, meaning my parents and Uncle Harry, was basically over the fact that Mr. Malfoy tormented them at school. My dad was just stubborn—perhaps it was a guy thing?

In any case, Scorpius and I started over to the Gryffindor table, and, thankfully, the noise in the room rose again. No one was staring anymore, and I was beginning to build up confidence. This wouldn't be so bad. Maybe Albus ate a bad apple or something, and that was why he looked so angry. Yeah, that definitely was the case. When I glanced at him again, he didn't look angry any more. In fact, he looked a little like Hugo—like he could care less. This was good!

"Oh my gosh, you guys are _totally_ going out!" Lily exclaimed when we got closer to the table. The noise in the Great Hall disappeared again, and I exhaled slowly. Scorpius squeezed my hand encouragingly, but I just glared at Lily. She didn't seem to notice. "Hugo, I just had the greatest idea! You know how we're doubling for the Hogsmeade trip?" Hugo nodded, rolling his eyes at me. I smiled. "You, Rose, and I should triple! That would be so _fun_! I've never gone on a triple date before."

I heard Scorpius chuckle beside me—a sort of sarcastic chuckle. I had to agree with him on this one; that was the stupidest idea I had ever heard. I didn't know many people who had ever gone on a triple, because, really, it was never done. Most people didn't even go out on double dates anymore. And Scorpius and I were both seventeen. Going out on a triple date with fifteen-year-olds wouldn't go over well with our friends. Especially when I was related to the two we were tripling with.

"I'm not tripling with Rose!" Hugo snapped, looking wide-eyed at Lily. She looked seriously offended, as if she thought her plan was the greatest one in the world. "Lily, she's my _sister_. You don't go on triple dates with your sister! All of my friends, not to mention, _Janice_, would think that she's spying on me for mum or something! And Michael would think the same thing, wouldn't he?"

Lily pondered this, and after a moment, she frowned. "Yeah, I guess so," she admitted unwillingly, and Hugo smiled smugly. Lily sighed angrily and crossed her arms across her chest. "It would have been a good idea if she wasn't related to us, though! You have to admit that."

"No, it really wasn't," Scorpius muttered to me, but Lily appeared to have heard, since she sighed again. I bit my lip to suppress a laugh as Hugo and Lily moved away from each other on the bench to make room for Scorpius and I (and probably to get away from each other). Since I was fairly certain Lily didn't want to sit next to Scorpius after hearing his comment, I took the liberty of sitting down next to her—and I didn't really want to sit down next to my brother, so it was fine with me.

Albus, who was directly across from me, hadn't said anything since Scorpius and I walked over to the table. But, as I said, he was definitely putting on an act now that we were over here. He didn't look angry anymore, just slightly bothered while attempting to smile. It actually looked really strange, as if he were struggling to keep his face like that. I almost wanted to say something to him about it, but then I decided it was best not to comment on his face, since he would probably be insulted.

I grabbed an apple from the basket in front of me and started on it, while Scorpius immediately started for the desserts. I shook my head and rolled my eyes, then catching Albus' eyes and smiling. He actually managed to relax his face and keep the smile, looking much less strange than he had before. And the smile now seemed to be genuine, whereas before… well, that was just fake.

"So, who made the first move?" Lily asked me, looking very interested. "And when?"

"I thought they were already going out," Hugo mentioned from the other side of Scorpius, leaning forward to look at Lily. "Haven't they been dating since our first year, when we came here?" I looked at him, shocked. My own brother even thought that Scorpius and I were going out when we weren't. It was pathetic.

"Um," I muttered, shaking my head slowly. "No."

Hugo shrugged, and went back to cleaning his plate. I took another bite of my apple, before answering Lily's question. "Well," I said, swallowing the rest of the apple I had in my mouth, "it was kind of both of us—last night when Scorpius was doing rounds for Albus. Speaking of that, Scorpius, do you have his badge?"

Scorpius, whose mouth was stuffed with some sort of pastry, nodded and pulled the badge out from his pocket. He threw it over to Albus, who caught it in one hand. Yeah, if that had been me… well, I probably would have missed, or it probably would have hit me in the face.

"Thanks," Albus said to Scorpius, which was actually the first thing he had said at all. "Oh, Rose, a letter came for you this morning from your parents. I brought it upstairs for you, though, since you weren't at breakfast—I figured you'd get it since I left it on the table you usually work at. Did you?" I shook my head, and he shrugged. "Do you want to go get it when you're done eating?"

I knew what he was trying to do. Oh, he wasn't lying to me; I knew that I really had gotten a letter—probably a reply from the letter I sent my father. But he was just trying to get me away from everyone else, so he could tell me whatever he wanted to without anyone else having an input. Because no one else agreed with him—they were fine with my dating Scorpius. He was the only one who wasn't.

Though, I certainly couldn't say no. I had a little time right now to actually go read the letter, and I was curious. I wouldn't be able to wait until later to go read it. And Albus would talk to me at some point, anyway, so it was better to get it over with now rather than later.

"Sure," I said, putting down my half-eaten apple and standing up. Scorpius looked at me, and I smiled. "I'm done now. Why don't you go back to the Slytherin table, Scorpius?" I winked at him, and he nodded, standing up next to me at the same time as Albus stood. They looked at each other, Albus smiling sarcastically. I was sure that Scorpius could tell, since, with a scowl, he walked away. I rolled my eyes and walked out of the Great Hall without another word to anyone. Albus caught up to me in a second.

"Why are you so annoying, Potter?" I asked him as we started for the Grand Staircase.

"What are you talking about, _Weasley_?" Albus replied innocently, and I glared at him. Oh, he knew exactly what was talking about. He was just proving my own point.

"Oh, cut the act, we're alone," I retorted, feeling my face heat up angrily. Albus actually looked startled for a moment, but recovered quite quickly. He ran a hand through his dark hair and looked at me carefully, as if any move he made might trigger a reaction from me. "I don't get what the big deal is, okay, Albus? He has _always_ been nice to you. Why do you hate him?"

"I don't," Albus replied, looking honestly offended. I blinked, taken aback by this. We made our way up the stairs for a moment in silence, and then he spoke again. "I guess I'm happy for you two, but things are just getting so strange now… My mum told me that James has noticed that some of his old friends who were in Slytherin aren't talking to him anymore. And all the Muggle killings—I just can't seem to trust the Slytherins anymore. Don't you think they seem a bit distant?"

I furrowed my eyebrows. I hadn't noticed that at all, but now that Albus had said that, I probably would. "Scorpius isn't," I pointed out, and Albus smiled weakly.

"He could," Albus shrugged. "His father was in Voldemort's inner circle, and I know you'll just say he didn't want to be. But he still _was_. You know Dumbledore, the guy I was named after?" I nodded. Albus was named after Dumbledore, who, ironically, was killed by the Severus Snape, who Albus was also named after—but Snape was a good guy. "Scorpius' father was assigned by Voldemort to kill Dumbledore."

Well, no one had ever mentioned _that_ part of the story to me. I looked at Albus, dumbfounded, and shook my head. "He didn't kill him, though. Severus Snape killed Dumbledore," I said, and Albus nodded.

"True," he continued, as we entered the Gryffindor Tower. "But Draco Malfoy was still assigned to kill him, wasn't he? Anyway, he couldn't do it. Perhaps he wants to redeem himself now by killing the Muggles, since he didn't kill Dumbledore. I don't know. You'll say that he was a good person, and that's why he couldn't do it. I just say he was too scared, too weak. He _could_ redeem himself now."

I stared at him, shaking my head again as I stopped in front of the portrait to enter the common room. "You're wrong," I replied, saying the password to enter the common room quickly. I walked inside before Albus, but he caught up to me and spun me around to face him.

"The Malfoys are a pretty powerful pureblood family—and to be honest, there aren't very many left anymore," Albus told me, and I averted my gaze. "Wouldn't they want to show that off?"

"You're a bloody fool," I retorted, and Albus backed away. I turned around and grabbed the letter, which was sitting where Albus had said he put it. It was already opened, and I looked back at Albus angrily. If I didn't have self-control, I probably would have punched him in the face. "Did you read my letter? That's my mail! You can't read my mail!"

Albus shrugged. "I may have glanced at it."

"I don't read your mail!" I yelled, and he furrowed his eyebrows uncomfortably before going to sit down on the couch. I took a moment to simply breathe for a moment before reading the letter, just because if I didn't, I probably would have broken something. I finally unfolded the letter, looking at Albus sharply before reading it.

_Dear Rose,_

_I understand your concern for your best friend's family, but this is something you'll have to keep out of. It's serious stuff. I know I've never really been one for the serious stuff (I worked with your Uncle George for a couple of years!), but this is real life. You understand that._

_For the record, though, I have some bad news regarding Draco Malfoy. I tried to convince everyone that he's innocent, and so did Uncle Harry, but there was too much evidence saying he was part of the attacks. He's going to be arrested and will have a hearing within the next week._

_I'm sorry, Rose._

_Dad_

I let the letter slip from my fingers and fall to the floor, and my hands began to shake in front of me. Everything seemed to start spinning, and my breathing got harder. It was a matter of seconds before I felt Albus beside me, guiding me to the sofa. There was a sick feeling in my stomach as I comprehended what the letter meant.

Scorpius' father was going to be arrested.

I looked at Albus' blurry form, and shook my head. "No, I mean… he's innocent," I muttered, although I knew the words were coming out slurred and messed up. "Albus… how could he? My best friend's _father_? He couldn't… I—I… I hate him!"

"Rose, I really am sorry," Albus said slowly, wrapping his arms around me. I leaned onto his shoulder and began to cry. I knew he was sorry—but I was a hell of a lot sorrier than he was.

--

**Author's Note:** Boo. That's depressing. But, hey, you all knew it was coming, right? Right? Or maybe I was doing an awesome job of covering that up. I don't know.

Anyway, how will Scorpius react? Or… will Rose even tell him, or will she wait for him to find out by himself? Who knows? Well, I do, actually, but you don't. So, ha!

For some more depressing news, I totally didn't get as many reviews for the last chapter as I wanted to. Oh well. I'll get over it—if you review this chapter! Yay! _Por favor_?

Thanks!


	12. Seer

**Chapter Twelve – Seer**

I had no idea what I was doing or why I was doing it. My legs seemed to just move me towards the Divination classroom, and my hands had seemed to just grab my dream journal and the letter from my father. My mind was no longer functioning correctly, and for once, I was okay with that. I didn't want to think about what had just happened. I didn't want to think about the fact that I was wrong—that Scorpius and I were wrong—and that his father was going to be arrested for having connections to the Muggle killings.

Albus had been confused when I sat up abruptly (nearly knocking him in the chin with my head) and declared that I was going to see Professor Firenze. He would know what was going on with everything strange that had been happening—my dream, the Muggle killings, Scorpius' dream, Mr. Malfoy's arrest. There had to be _some_ sort of connection. I mean, sure, I had no psychic ability at all, and neither did Scorpius (we only took the class because we knew it was the one class we could have together). But something was wrong, and Albus didn't try to stop me from going to see Professor Firenze, even though I knew he thought it was stupid.

I ran towards the Divination room, praying silently that Professor Firenze was there, or at least in his office. My eyes were blurry with tears, and I nearly ran into a couple of walls, but eventually, I made it to the room. I climbed the ladder, carrying the dream journal and the letter in one hand and gripping the rungs of the ladder in my other. Slowly, I reached the classroom, and looked around after drying my eyes. Professor Firenze wasn't in there. He had to be in his office.

I walked to his office door, which was shut tightly. Before I even raised my hand up to the wood, I heard his old voice call out to me, "Come in, Miss Weasley." I opened the door slowly, cautiously, and saw him looking over some of the dream journals from one of his other classes. He looked tired and somewhat frustrated, but when he looked at me, he still seemed to be a little concerned.

"Um, Professor," I said, swallowing quietly, "I have a question for you about my dream journal. The other day when I showed you my entry, you said that it was interesting and mentioned how I was afraid of the connections between the dream and the Muggle killings. I need to know what is going on, Professor. My best friend's dad is going to be arrested—the one I recognized in my dream—and Scorpius told me that he had a dream, seeing his father arrested. What's happening to us?"

Professor Firenze sighed and put down the dream journal he was reading. "Miss Weasley, there is a large connection between what is happening in your head and what is happening outside of it. Strangely enough, it seems to me that you and Mr. Malfoy have acquired a bit of divination skills from taking the class for so long. I have never seen that happen before," he admitted, and I threw a hand over my mouth to keep me from screaming out. "Not very much, though. You can only foresee things that are connected to you."

I moved my hand to my cheek and raised an eyebrow. "What are you saying, Professor? That I'm a Seer or something? That my dream is going to happen at some point? That Scorpius will… disappear?" I asked, horrified by the idea of it. I wasn't a Seer! I had never predicted anything correctly in my entire life! I made up half of the stuff on my Divination exams and hoped that I would get credit for it. There was no way that my dream would _ever_ happen.

"It may not happen exactly as you saw it in your dream, but, yes, it will happen at some point. I evaluated your dream after that class and saw that it would happen eventually. It may please you to know that you are not in any danger, however," he added, and I slammed my dream journal and the letter down on his desk, curling my hands into fists.

"I don't care if I'm safe!" I shrieked, my face growing hot. My nails were digging into my palms because I was clenching my fists so hard, but I didn't loosen it. "I have to keep it from happening! I don't know where Scorpius went in my dream, and I _know_ that his father is innocent. Someone has to be framing him or something, because he didn't do it! My dream can't happen! I'm not a Seer… my mother quit the class because she was so bad at it, and my dad was just as pathetic at it!"

"Miss Weasley," Professor Firenze started, but I picked my dream journal and letter back up and stuffed it in my pocket, walking out of the room without another word. There was no way I was going to let Scorpius out of my sight—at least until I proved that his father was innocent. I sincerely hoped that he hadn't received a letter or anything from his mother, yet. I had to say something to him first. I ran all the way back to the Great Hall—but when I reached it, the bell immediately rang. There was no way I was going to be able to find Scorpius in the crowd.

It occurred to me then that my brother was tall enough for me to pick out of a crowd, especially with his bright red hair. I stood on my toes, cursing that I had inherited my mother's short gene, and sought out Hugo. It was a matter of moments before I saw the bushel of red hair appear in the crowd, and I forced my way through to it.

"Hugo! Where's Scorpius?" I demanded, after finding my way to my brother and discovering that Scorpius was nowhere around. Hugo looked at me, startled that I had suddenly appeared in front of him, and blinked.

"What?" he muttered, before realizing what I had asked. "Oh, Scorpius. He went to go sit at his table before you left, remember? You told him to. I have no idea where he is now. Why? What's wrong?"

I moved with the crowd, and it took everything in my power to keep myself from just stopping and collapsing. I couldn't remember the last time Hugo had actually asked me what was wrong—the last time he _cared_ what was wrong. I wanted to give him a hug, actually, but I knew that he would resent me for the rest of his life if I did. And I didn't like hugging people, anyway.

Then, of course, I realized that he was right, and that I had told Scorpius to go talk to his Slytherin friends. I would never be able to find him now, unless I went to his next class and found him before the class started. Yeah, I could do that—he had Transfiguration, I was pretty sure. I would just explain to Professor Longbottom that there was a legitimate family emergency, and that was why I was late to Herbology.

"Um, something very bad has happened to Scorpius' father," I told Hugo, unsure of how I should word it. "And I need to find him before he hears it from someone else. Thanks for your help, Hugo. I'll see you later. Have fun in… whatever class you have now."

I pushed through the crowd once again, running up the stairs towards the Transfiguration classroom. It was probably a good thing that I was Head Girl, because if a prefect found me running in the halls, I could get in trouble. Technically, I could have gotten in trouble, anyway, but I knew more magic than most of the prefects. No one would ever know if I hexed them.

What was I _saying_? I was Head Girl for crying out loud! I shouldn't be thinking that…

I beat Scorpius to the classroom, apparently, since he wasn't there when I arrived. I leaned up against the wall for a second before sliding down to the ground, putting my head in my hands. My eyes began to water again, and then the tears sprung from my eyes, falling onto my hands and sliding down my arms. My breathing became deep, and I could barely hear if anyone was coming.

I didn't know what was happening to me—to Scorpius and I. His dream was actually going to happen—someone was going to go knock on his house door and arrest his father. Then, my dream would be next. I would be running through the woods, I would find Scorpius, he would disappear, and Mr. Malfoy would find me. Why was Scorpius in the woods in the first place?

The woods! I would just have to avoid the woods, was all!

"Rosie, what are do—are you _crying_?" a voice asked me, and I recognized it as Scorpius's voice. I moved my hands, wiping my eyes quickly as I did so, and looked up at him. He knelt down to my eye level and raised an eyebrow. "What did Albus say to you? Because if he was the one who made you cry, I'll hex him until he cries, if you want."

I smiled weakly, and sniffled. "No, it wasn't Albus," I said, wiping a tear off my face that had escaped from my eye. "Albus was actually… fine. I got a letter from my dad that had some bad news in it."

"Did something happen to someone in your family?" Scorpius asked, looking concerned. I bit my lip and shook my head, allowing another tear to fall from my eye. He reached out with one hand to wipe it away, but his finger stayed there as we stared at each other. Soon, his whole hand cupped my cheek, and I leaned into it. "Rosie, what happened?"

"Your father… he's going to be arrested," I told him slowly, watching as his face changed from concerned to disbelieving to furious. He pulled his hand away from my face and fell to the floor from his kneeling position, staring at the floor instead of looking at me. There was something about saying the truth aloud that just made it seem even worse than it already was. And the look on Scorpius' face only supported that.

"You're joking," he muttered, looking at me angrily again. "How could you joke about something like that?"

I let my head fall back into my hands, so I could cry again. I couldn't stop myself—I just let myself collapse. My entire body shook as I sobbed uncontrollably. I had never really been one to cry—I tried not to as much as possibly. But a part of me just felt as if this whole thing was my fault. Plus, I was the one who had to break it to him.

"Bloody hell, Rose!" Scorpius exclaimed, and I picked my head up to look at him. "My dad!"

He ran a hand through his blonde hair and shook his head. "I have the letter," I murmured, handing him the letter from my pocket. He took it and read it through, putting it down beside him when he finished. All the color drained from his face (not that there had been much to begin with, since he had always been fair skinned), and he looked at me.

"You _promised_ that he would be fine," he said, looking angrily at me. "I strictly remember you saying, 'Scorpius, he'll be fine. I promise.'" He imitated my voice, going up an octave with his own. It would have been comical had the situation not been so serious. "Now my father is going to be arrested for something I _know_ he would never do. Rose, you promised he'd be fine!"

"I know! I know I did!" I admitted, moving closer to him. This was a mistake. Scorpius stared at me, disgusted, and stood up. He shook his head at me, and I noticed that his eyes began to water. Scorpius never cried—except, he had never had reason to before. His dad was getting arrested; he definitely had reason to cry now.

"Rose, I need you to go," he said, even toned. I scrambled to my feet, staring at him disbelievingly. "Listen, I know that this isn't your fault, and you couldn't control this particular promise, but I can't…" He paused, walking toward me and taking my hands in his. "Rosie, I love you, but I don't think this is going to work out. I mean, who were we trying to kid, anyway? I'm a Slytherin, you're a Gryffindor. You're dad wouldn't want you to date the son of a criminal, anyway."

"Scorpius, that isn't true, and you know it!" I cried, and he frowned at me.

"Yes, it is," he replied, moving his hands to cradle my face, and he kissed me softly. "Sorry, Rose. You know it's true, too." He paused and backed away from me. "I'll probably get a letter from my mum soon, and then everyone in the entire school will know. You don't want to be with me when that happens. You have a good reputation."

"Scorpius, stop…" I pleaded. I saw a single tear trickle down his cheek, and my eyes followed it as it fell to the floor. "I know you're father is innocent, too. I'm going to support that, but I have to do it with you. We've been best friends since first year. You can't really say that you can just walk away from me like this."

I almost saw a smile flicker on his face, but at the last second, he swiped it off his face. "You're right. If your father wanted me gone, he would have come after me by now. But Rosie, my _father_. How can _we_ prove he's innocent?" he asked, wiping his eyes with his hands. "I mean, your father and your uncle already tried to defend him, but they failed—and they're pretty high up in the Auror department. If they can't do it, who can?"

To be completely honest, I had no idea. My dad and my uncle were among the most trusted people in the department, and they were pretty close to the Minister of Magic (my uncle was especially trusted because of the whole killing-Voldemort thing). And Scorpius was right; they had failed at ensuring the innocence of Mr. Malfoy.

Everything was messed up.

"We _can_," I said anyway, folding my arms across my chest. "Listen, I talked to Professor Firenze about your dream and my dream, and he said that we've been in the class for so long that we may have picked up some skill. We just have to make sure the future works out in our favor."

Scorpius furrowed his eyebrows. "You talked to Professor Firenze about my dream?" he asked, a bit angrily, and I nodded slowly. "And he said that we were Seers?"

"Well… not really. Just people who have been in Divination long enough to be able to predict things that have connections to our lives. So, if we see something bad happening, we just have to work around it and fix it. Eventually everything would have to go back to normal, right?" I shrugged, and Scorpius frowned.

"I don't dream, remember?" he told me. "It was just that one time… Oh, Rose, what if my father really is guilty? I mean, I haven't been home since Christmas, and I don't write to him. He _could_ have something to do with the Muggle killings for all I know. I've been saying that he's innocent this whole time because that's what I _want_ to think. But I really have no idea."

When I thought about this, I knew Scorpius was right. I didn't know Mr. Malfoy at all. In fact, most of the things I knew about him were bad things that either my dad or Albus told me (like how he tormented my parents throughout school, and, apparently, how he was supposed to kill Dumbledore). My parents didn't like to talk about the Malfoys, and I tried not to bring them up, either. So, for all I knew, Albus could be right about Mr. Malfoy.

For all I knew, Draco Malfoy could really be guilty.

--

**Author's Note:** _¡Hola, amigos!_

I don't know about you, but I am so proud of myself for updating this quickly. Unfortunately, this chapter wasn't the greatest one in the world, in my opinion, so I'm a little less proud of myself than I'd usually be. I have no idea why, but when I planned out this chapter, it was so much better than it actually turned out to be. Seriously. It's unfortunate.

Still, I couldn't have them go break up the first day they started going out! So, you must be happy that I kept them together, even though Scorpius wanted them to break up. He was only doing it to protect her, though, which I thought was sweet. I mean, really, that was nice of him—but he was being kind of stubborn about it.

Speaking of that, I totally didn't get Scorpius's emotions out the way I wanted to. He cried only a tiny bit, which was what I wanted (because, let's face it, Scorpius is too much of a man to cry), but he didn't actually get, like, _upset_ about the fact that his father was getting arrested. Well, he did, but not the way I wanted him to. I don't know, I'm confusing myself, and I'm probably confusing you, as well.

Anyway, I hope you liked the chapter, even if I wasn't the biggest fan of it. I updated faster than I said I was going to again! I'm probably confusing everyone… well, at least the people I told when I would update… heh, oh well. I was less busy than I thought I was going to be, apparently. Which was nice, since I'll be busy next week. Or too tired to do anything.

The plot belongs to me, but the characters, setting, etc. (basically everything you recognize) belongs to J.K. Rowling. Yeah, I had to throw a disclaimer into this chapter, since I've kind of forgotten to…


	13. Dreamland

**Chapter Thirteen – Dreamland**

I had no clue what I was supposed to do now. There was a part of me that just wanted to give up, to just let things unfold as they were supposed to without my interference. My dad was right; this was just something that I had to keep my nose out of. I mean, I didn't even _know_ Draco Malfoy. I had never met him, although I had seen him at Platform 9 ¾ with his wife. He didn't really look like the type of guy who would walk around killing Muggles, but I was sure Tom Riddle hadn't looked like a murderer when he was younger, either.

Still, the other part of me (which seemed to be larger and more significant) wanted to hold onto the idea that Draco Malfoy was innocent. I _wanted_ to stick my nose into this or just dive right into it. My parents, after all, had had a knack for sticking their noses into places where they didn't belong in their time at Hogwarts, as did my Uncle Harry and, occasionally, my Aunt Ginny. I _had_ to make sure that Scorpius' father was proved innocent at the trial.

Then again, I felt as if I was being greedy. Maybe the only reason I wanted Draco Malfoy to be innocent was because his son was my best friend (and my boyfriend, I guessed, assuming that Scorpius really didn't want me to leave). Maybe I didn't want to have a best friend whose father was a murderer—maybe I didn't want to learn that there really was a dark part of the world, even after Voldemort was gone. Maybe I didn't want to lose my best friend because of a secret.

I sat alone in the Gryffindor common room, after I decided that I couldn't go to Herbology in the state I was in. Scorpius went to Transfiguration, anyway (which was surprising, especially because I was skipping a class, and Scorpius was not—and that definitely never happened), even after hearing the bad news. He was being surprisingly brave, considering his father was going to be arrested. Either that, or his way of coping with this was actually going to class.

I lounged on the couch, leaning my head against the pillow. My gaze traveled up to the ceiling, and I stared at it for a few moments before shutting my eyes. There was just something about crying that made me tired—and I had done enough of that today to drain all of my energy. I would just shut my eyes for a few moments—that was all. I just needed a little nap, and then I would be okay. Beside, maybe this was all a dream, anyway. Perhaps falling asleep would help me wake up.

"Hey, she's in here," I heard a female voice say, and I stirred from my place on the couch—except, it didn't really feel like the couch. Whatever it was I was laying on was extremely hard, and it made my body ache, my head especially. The pillow I had my head on before was missing, too. Still, I didn't bother to open my eyes and figure out what I was laying on now. I still needed more sleep; I had been having a nightmare, and it was hard to sleep because of it.

"Rose, are you okay?" someone else said, a male voice, this time. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and someone began to shake me very gently. I closed my eyes tighter and tried to ignore whoever was shaking me, but this only made them shake me harder. I let my entire body relax, hoping that the dead weight would make them leave. It didn't. "Rose, wake up!"

I moaned, and I heard one of the people sigh. They stopped shaking me, and I finally decided to open my eyes and see who the people were that were shaking me. I blinked, seeing Hugo looking down at me, looking concerned. Behind him, I could see Albus looking down at me beside Lily, and behind them was Lily's curious-looking boyfriend, Michael.

"Rose, what happened to you? Are you all right?" Hugo demanded, sounding more angry than concerned now. I was surprised (and flattered) again by Hugo's sudden curiosity of my well-being, but I didn't let it show on my face. I simply stared at him, looking confused because, well, I _was_ confused. I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. Of course, I was all right, despite my headache. I had just been sleeping—sure, I had been having a nightmare, which I didn't want to have to relive by writing it down in my journal, but it wasn't a big deal.

Wait a minute, why wasn't Hugo in class? I hadn't been asleep for _that_ long. Sure, it would probably be hypocritical of me to ask him why he was out of class, but I was the older sister. I was supposed to ask those things, even if it made me a hypocrite. So, that was precisely what I did. Instead of answering his question, I asked why he wasn't in class.

"Um, classes are all over," Hugo replied, looking up at Albus for help. Albus bent down beside Hugo and stared at me, and I stared back with an eyebrow raised. How could classes already be over? All I did was take a little nap. I had gotten a lot of sleep the previous night (considering I had slept through my first two—and a half—classes), so I should have only slept through Herbology. "And you missed dinner, too."

I missed dinner, and I had already missed breakfast today, as well. Shouldn't my stomach have woken me up by now, especially considering that all I ate for lunch was half an apple? My stomach did feel a little empty, but it wasn't grumbling

"You never skip class, and when you didn't show up in Herbology, Professor Longbottom asked me where you were," Albus added, and I furrowed my eyebrows. I _had_ skipped some classes before—oh, but Albus didn't know about that. "Then you didn't come to dinner, which probably meant that you had skipped your other classes, too. We didn't know where you were, and the last time I saw you, you were all upset. I asked Scorpius where you were at dinner, and he said he didn't know. Then, Lily went to the library after dinner to find you, but, obviously, you weren't there."

"What are you doing on the floor, anyway?" Michael asked, and I glanced down. _That_ was the hard thing I was laying on. No wonder it was uncomfortable—I must have fallen off the couch when I was sleeping. That would explain why my head hurt, as well. I probably hit my head when I fell off the couch. And maybe that was why I didn't wake up when I thought I would.

"Sleeping," I replied, and everyone looked at me as though I were crazy. "I started off on the couch. I just fell off the couch or something." I paused, giving everyone a chance to roll their eyes at me. "I didn't want to go to Herbology, so I decided to take a little nap. I thought I was going to wake up in time to go to my next class, though. I didn't expect to sleep through all of them."

Albus handed me something, standing up to give me room to sit up (since he was kind of in my way before). I took whatever it was and took off its napkin wrapping; it was a sandwich. I climbed onto the sofa, and Hugo and Albus squished themselves beside me while Lily and Michael shared a one-person couch.

"We thought you might want to eat, since you missed breakfast, too," Albus said, motioning to the sandwich. I nodded, biting into the sandwich with a vulture-like intensity. I heard Hugo laugh beside me, and I looked at him, elbowing him in the side.

"Would you like to tell us what you were dreaming about?" Lily asked, and I looked over at her, alarmed. She only smiled innocently at me, not taking in my anxious expression. "You're not a violent sleeper. The only way you would have fallen off that couch was if you were having a nightmare. That's when you move in your sleep. That's also when you talk."

I blushed, wondering to myself what I could have possibly said in my sleep. What if I had said something embarrassing about myself in my sleep, like how I wet my bed until I was five? It was a good thing I had my own room at home, because Hugo definitely would have used something like that against me if he heard me say it in my sleep.

Everyone was watching me, and I lowered my sandwich from my mouth and chewed. When I swallowed, I put the sandwich on the coffee table and pulled my legs up onto the couch to hug them into my chest.

"I don't want to talk about it," I replied, and it was silent for a moment.

"Well, finish your sandwich," Hugo said, picking it up and handing it back to me. I looked at him with a smile, sincerely thankful that he was letting me off the hook. It was bad enough that I had to dream about it and write it down in my journal, but having to say it aloud was the worst. He smiled back at me, and at that moment, he seemed older than a fifteen-year-old to me.

Lily and Michael started a game of chess going as I finished my sandwich, and Albus and Hugo started on some homework. By the time I had finished my sandwich, Hugo was beating Lily at chess now, and Michael and Albus had started up another game. Albus was winning, as far as I could tell, but Michael had the opportunity to come back and win.

I pulled my dream journal out from my pocket and picked a quill out of a jar on the coffee table. No one was sitting next to me anymore, so I didn't have to worry about anyone reading over my shoulder. Other people were working at different tables in the room, so I stayed at my place on the couch. I began to write.

"_State your name," the Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, said to a man with blonde hair. He looked slightly embarrassed. In the background, I could see a woman with brown hair, looking upset. I recognized this woman as the wife of the blonde man._

"_Draco Malfoy," the blonde man replied coolly, despite his embarrassed expression._

"You have been convicted of murdering three Muggles, whose names we are not releasing, with an Unforgivable Curse," Shacklebolt continued, looking down at Mr. Malfoy from his podium. "How do you plead to the charges against you?"

_Mr. Malfoy's face twisted into a crooked smile, and for a moment, I really thought he was about to say that he was guilty. The look on his face was deceiving, and I would have bet my entire back account that he had something to do with the Muggle killings at that point. Mrs. Malfoy was holding her breath in the background, and the color had all drained from her pretty face. Then, Mr. Malfoy spoke, and I was the one holding my breath._

"_Not guilty."_

_The scene dissolved in front of me—perhaps this was when I fell off the couch, since I usually switched dreams when I changed the position of my body. For a moment, there was nothing—I was just sleeping. Then, I began to dream again, and I was in Azkaban. This was nothing like the old pictures I had seen of the place—there were no Dementors, but there were guards. Plus, it seemed a lot less gloomy._

_Mr. Malfoy was sitting in a cell, talking to someone in a hooded cloak. I couldn't see the face of the person he was talking to, but I could tell that Mr. Malfoy didn't look too thrilled that he was actually talking to that particular person._

"_You have to find them," Mr. Malfoy was saying to someone in a whisper. "Kill them, even, if you can. They don't deserve to live—someone will kill them, eventually, so it doesn't matter who does it, I suppose."_

"_Okay," the cloaked person replied. His voice was muffled because of the cloak, so I couldn't recognize the voice, either. But it was definitely a male, who seemed to be at least in his thirties. Close to Mr. Malfoy's age, probably._

_Mr. Malfoy leaned back from the bars and crossed his arms. "Why are you helping me, again?" he asked, looking skeptically at the cloaked man._

"_Hmm…" the cloaked man muttered, and I knew that he had to be smiling underneath that hood. "I think you know why. Your son…" Mr. Malfoy's eyes widened, but he nodded, a signal that he understood._

"_Right," Mr. Malfoy said, running a hand through his hair. "Scorpius."_

"_You know about…" The cloaked man started to say something, but I was woken up by my brother and cousins. I didn't get to hear whatever the cloaked man had to say. There was something about him, though, that made it seem like whatever he was going to say, I didn't want to hear. Especially because it probably had to do with Scorpius. And, personally, I didn't want to know._

"Is that your dream journal?" Hugo asked, sitting down next to me on the couch. I slammed my journal shut and clutched it against my chest, but Hugo rolled his eyes. "I didn't say I wanted to read it—and I wasn't looking at it while you were writing, either. Just… so you know."

"Thanks," I said with a small smile. I handed it to him, and he looked at me, surprised. "Go ahead. You can read it."

"Oh," Hugo murmured, opening to the page I just wrote. He began to read it, and I watched as Lily was playing chess against Albus now. Lily was beating him, and, as far as I could tell, there wasn't much of a chance that Albus was going to win, unless Lily messed up big time By the time Hugo finished reading my entry, Lily had already checked Albus' king twice.

"Well, it was just a dream, right? It's not like you live by your dreams…" Hugo finally said, as he handed the journal back to me.

I blinked, thinking about what Professor Firenze had said to me. Then I thought about what Albus said to me the first time I heard about the Muggle killings: _No one should live in a dreamland, Rose._

I sighed, looking at Hugo and searching his bright brown eyes. "Right," I muttered. "It's not like I live in a dreamland."

Somehow, though, that was exactly where I was.

--

**Author's Note:** Hey! The title of my fanfiction is also the title of this chapter! That's weird. Well, not really.

Does anyone else love Hugo? Maybe I'm not supposed to say that I like my own interpretation of the characters (I mean, doesn't that make me sound a little conceited if I do that? Or maybe everyone else does it, and I'm just too modest?). But I still love Hugo! I think he would be wonderful to have as a little brother. Okay, I've never actually wanted a little brother, but if I had to pick one, I'd pick Hugo. He's so adorable! Even though he's fifteen, and he would be incredibly insulted if I called him adorable to his face!

Anyway, my point was, Hugo rocks.

Speaking of that, I've been looking on DA (Deviant Art, for all of you who have no idea what DA means—whoa! It could mean Dumbledore's Army, too!) for pictures of the **Scorose** couple (apparently, that's what they're called now). I found an amazing one of them kissing. Seriously, it was amazing. So, I totally think everyone should go look on Deviant Art for next gen. drawings. There are some BRILLIANT ones.

Yeah, that's my speech for the day. Happy reading!


	14. Rosie

**Chapter Fourteen – Rosie**

"What are you doing, Rose?" Scorpius asked softly, coming up behind me and making me jump. I was in the library, reading a Transfiguration book in preparation for N.E.W.T.s. I decided that, for now, I wasn't going to think about the past events that had occurred outside of the school. I needed to focus on my education—my dad was right, anyway. I didn't need to stick my nose in places where it didn't belong. And it didn't belong anywhere besides on my face.

"Studying," I replied coolly, trying to act as if he hadn't startled me at all. Still, my heart was pounding inside my chest, and it wasn't going to slow down anytime soon—at least, not with Scorpius here. He didn't seem to notice that I had jumped anyway, since he probably would have laughed at me if he had. Then again, the circumstances we were under now weren't normal. Maybe he just didn't feel like laughing anymore.

I turned around in my seat to look at him, and my face fell when I glanced at him. His hands were stuffed into his pockets, and his eyes were sad, even though he was trying to smile at me. I furrowed my eyebrows together, closing my book with one hand and stood up to face him completely. He didn't move when I reached out to hold his hands, pulling them from his pockets, but he seemed to wince. I pretended not to notice, but something stabbed at my heart like a knife.

"Don't you know what today is?" he questioned, and I furrowed my eyebrows even more. Well, no, I didn't know what today was. Mr. Malfoy's hearing wasn't scheduled until Monday, and today was Saturday. I didn't know why Scorpius would be so upset if he still had a couple of more days before his hearing. Of course, I already knew how the hearing would work out, but I wouldn't tell Scorpius that.

Oh… Today was _Saturday_. Today was the trip to Hogsmeade—the one that I had agreed to go with Scorpius to, as a date. I had been in the library all day studying, and it had to be close to dinner now, since I'd been in here for hours. I had forgotten all about Hogsmeade with everything that was going on now. I had stood Scorpius up—unintentionally, of course, but I had still stood him up!

"Oh my goodness," I muttered, pulling my hands away from Scorpius was such a force that I fell back into my chair. I stared up at him, shaking my head at myself. "I am _so_ sorry. I didn't even realize that the Hogsmeade trip was today—I just looked at it as a Saturday and came up here to study. I didn't even remember about our date. I've been so confused lately, and I just couldn't remember. There's just too much going on, and I hadn't had much time to study since everything started… I am _really_ sorry, Scorpius. I didn't mean to stand you up."

Scorpius blinked, and it was his turn to look confused now. "They haven't left yet. We're going in fifteen minutes, though, and everyone is already outside. I was just confused when you didn't come out, so I came back in to look for you. I figured you'd be in here like every other Saturday, since I knew you probably forgot about today. It's only eleven forty-five," he replied, and I cocked my head to the side. I was befuddled again. I had been in the library for hours. At least, it felt like hours.

I stood up abruptly, leaving the Transfiguration book on the table (silently hoping that the librarian wouldn't notice), and grabbed Scorpius' hand again to pull him out of the library. "Hurry up, then, I don't want to be late," I huffed, as I sprinted down the stairs (which was a lot more difficult than I thought, considering I was pulling Scorpius along). He stopped me at the bottom of the stairs, spinning me around to face him and holding my wrists so I wouldn't run. That had come across my mind.

"I said we had fifteen minutes, not thirty seconds. Personally, I'm surprised you made it down those stairs without falling," he told me, and I glared at him. I was a lot more coordinated than anyone gave me credit for. "Slow down, Rosie. We have time. I found you just in time."

He pressed his lips against mine, and I melted. My legs became jelly, and Scorpius lifted me off the ground, feeling my sudden flimsiness. I couldn't keep myself from laughing, but even as I smiled, he continued to kiss me. He almost started laughing with me, but he caught himself at the last second and pushed himself harder against me.

I couldn't help but feel that his last words had multiple meanings, and the butterflies in my stomach rose to my chest. He _did_ find me just in time, in more ways than one.

I tried to think (which was hard to do, seeing as he was kissing me with a force that probably could have knocked me out from amazement) about the last time he called me _Rosie_. It was a while back—he had been so _serious_ the past couple of days, so he had just been calling me _Rose_. Which was fine with me, but I _liked_ it when he called me by my nickname. He had been calling me Rosie for a long time.

"Hey, Rosie, do you think you could let me borrow your stuff from Uncle George? I know you still have it, and I'm all out of my stuff," James, my older cousin, said, and I blushed. I wasn't supposed to have anything from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, so I resorted to hiding it all under my bed where no one would find it. I had no idea how James could have figured out that I still had it. "My mum would yell at me if I sent a letter to Uncle George asking for more stuff."

"Rosie_," Scorpius muttered from my other side. We were all sitting at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall for lunch—Albus, Scorpius, Roxanne, James, Fred, and I. My other friends (most of them from Ravenclaw or Slytherin) always made fun of me because my family was so large. Scorpius even made fun of me because of my large family. I never thought of it as large, just cozy._

"_Yes, _Rosie_," I replied, and Scorpius burst out laughing. For an eleven-year-old, sometimes he could be strangely mature. Of course, then he would act like this, and I would see just how immature he was—and how annoying boys were. I crossed my arms, and glared angrily at him. It wasn't long before Albus joined into the chorus of laughter, and I glared over at him, as well. "What?"_

"_You're face. You look so mad," Albus replied, and Roxanne smiled beside him. I rolled my eyes._

"_Rosie makes you sound so young and girly! Don't three-year-old girls like being called nicknames like _Rosie_?" Scorpius sneered, and I swung my elbow into his ribs. He yowled in pain and clutched his side, looking up at me. James laughed uncontrollably, and he reached over to give me a high-five. James took only a moment to compose himself, but Scorpius took a little longer. "Fine, it isn't that bad a name! It's still girly, though."_

_I narrowed my eyes even more, so they were only slits on my face. "I _am_ a girl, thank you very much!" I exclaimed, and Scorpius seemed sarcastically shocked—although I wondered if that was just an act. Did he really know I was a girl? "And, for your information, I like being called _Rosie_. At least my name is normal, unlike yours. Scorpius Hyper—"_

"_Right, we don't have to go into our middle names" Scorpius replied, elbowing me now. He hadn't done it hard, but I couldn't keep myself from curling my hand into a fist for him to see. He froze, watching my hand with cautious eyes. "Well, if you like that better, I suppose I could try calling you _Rosie_ if you like it better… It's sort of weird." I fumed angrily. "Sorry, Rosie. So, Rosie, are you going to let James borrow your stuff or not, Rosie?"_

"_Um… yeah, sure," I muttered, looking at James, who was fighting back more laughter._

"_Rosie, that's very nice of you… Rosie," Scorpius said, and I elbowed him gently. Now, he was just being obnoxious about it. He didn't have to use it twice in every sentence. I glared at him, and he smiled weakly. "Sorry, Rosie."_

"What are you thinking about?" Scorpius asked, and I blinked. I hadn't even realized that I was back on the ground and that he had stopped kissing me. That was a pity; the end was usually the best part of the kiss. My mouth was tingling, though, so it must have been good. I was glad that Scorpius was back to normal—for the time being. Until his father was sent to Azkaban on Monday.

"First year," I replied, and this was a partial truth. I _had_ been thinking about an event _during_ our first year. "You didn't think I was a girl—I'm offended. Well, I was offended then… I'm glad you've finally realized that I'm not a boy, now, though."

Scorpius looked confused. "I knew you were a girl. I mean, you were a little meaner than most other girls I knew, but I still knew you were a girl," he said, and I knew he wasn't joking. I wasn't _mean_, exactly. I was just very intolerant of people and extremely pushy back in the day. Now, though, I was just carefree and relaxed. At least, I liked to think I was. That really wasn't the case.

"Sure," I said, anyway, rolling my eyes. "Now, stop distracting me. We're going to end up being late, and it will be _your_ fault. Shocker."

I ran away from Scorpius before he could attack me for that last crack. I heard him laughing behind me, though, and I smiled as I headed outside. The carriages to go down to Hogsmeade were already filling, and I hopped into one. It was a moment before Scorpius came into the carriage—I wondered if he had noticed which one I went into, or if he had been looking aimlessly in them to find me. Personally, I hoped it was the latter.

"Hey, Rosie!" someone exclaimed, climbing into the carriage with Scorpius and I. I closed my eyes and exhaled slowly, trying to calm myself. Lily was _not_ doing this to me. "Wow, I saw you guys go into this carriage and thought we could join you. I don't know where Hugo and Janice are, but we'll meet up with them later. We're going to the Three Broomsticks! Where are you guys going?"

Scorpius darted his eyes at me quickly enough that I noticed, and I understood his silent message: _Away from you_. I smiled, looking back at Lily and Michael, who had climbed into the seat opposite ours.

"Well, I have no idea. But I do remember Hugo complaining that he didn't want Scorpius and I near you, and, as his sister, I will respect his wishes," I said in response, and Lily's forehead creased stubbornly. I turned to Scorpius and frowned. "Where _are_ we going?"

"It's a surprise," he whispered, but I knew Lily and Michael could hear. Lily was still fuming, and Michael was quietly comforting her, but I saw him look at me for a moment and roll his eyes. I stifled a laugh, and he smiled. Scorpius eyes us, and after a moment, he shrugged and watched the scenery as we rolled down to Hogsmeade.

When we reached the village, Hugo and Janice were waiting for Lily and Michael already, and Scorpius and I stepped out of the carriage after they disappeared into the crowd. I put my hands on my hips and faced Scorpius, tilting my head to the side.

"What's the surprise?" I inquired with a smile. "Where are we going?"

"Surprise!" Scorpius muttered dryly, and I blinked, confused. "I have no idea where we're going. I was going to let you pick. I mean, we could always go to The Three Broomsticks for a bite to eat, too, or we could just go shopping."

I shook my head, moving my hands to cross them across my chest. "I'm not picking. No way. I always pick where we go, and then you always complain when I want to shop for some new clothes," I snapped, and Scorpius' pale face turned pink in a slight blush. My narrowed eyes relaxed, and I smiled. It wasn't often that Scorpius blushed, and it looked so adorable!

"Hey, Malfoy, you're still hanging around with Weasley?" someone called, and I looked over to see Jeanie Thomas smiling at us. "Wasn't her father the one who arrested your dad? Well, maybe I should phrase this the other way, although it works both, anyway. Weasley, you're still hanging around with Malfoy? His dad is a crook."

I pinned my hand on Scorpius' arm, holding him in a vice grip. He looked angry, and I had a feeling that if he didn't know I was here, he would have hexed Jeanie. If I wasn't Head Girl, I probably would have, too.

"He's not a crook. He's innocent, and my dad didn't arrest him. He was trying to defend Mr. Malfoy," I retorted, and Jeanie shrugged.

"There's a lot of talk going around, Scorpius. People are saying that your dad was the head of all of the Muggle attacks, and other people are saying that _you_ helped out with them, too," she continued, and now it was Scorpius' turn to constrict me. I jumped forward, lunging at her without pulling out my wand, but Scorpius clutched me from behind, holding my body against his. "Touchy, Weasley?"

"Be quiet, or I'll make you!" I yelled, but I didn't fight with Scorpius to get away. "Scorpius hasn't done anything, and I know you know he hasn't."

"Oh, I didn't say that I agreed with any of them," Jeanie said, looking honestly offended. "Scorpius is _my_ friend, too. I mean, yeah, it's a little strange that Mr. Malfoy used to be a Death Eater and now he's been arrested. And it's a little strange that I've seen Scorpius sneaking out in the middle of the night without an explanation—not that he knew I saw him, but… well, _now_ you know."

I pulled away with such a sudden, unexpected movement that it caught Scorpius off guard, and I escaped from his grasp. I spun around to face him, though, not to attack Jeanie. Scorpius had been sneaking out in the middle of the night? He never told me that—and I had never caught him before. He must have been sneaking out when he knew Albus and I weren't around.

"You've been doing _what_?" I demanded, looking incredulously at him. "Sneaking out! You do realize that I'm the Head Girl, right? If I had caught you, I wouldn't have let you off the hook. If you think you can just sneak out and not get in trouble…" I paused, inhaling and exhaling to calm myself. "Why have you been sneaking out?"

"Ah, yes, I've been wondering that, too," Jeanie chimed in, her soft, melodic voice sounding even more demanding than mine, although it was sweeter.

I noticed Scorpius swallow, which wasn't a good sign. "Rosie, I haven't been sneaking out for the reasons people are thinking. You obviously know me a lot better than that," he started lamely, and my eyes widened angrily.

"_Know_ you!" I exclaimed, backing away from him. "I didn't even know you were sneaking out at night, and I'm _supposed_ to know that. _Albus_ is supposed to know that. I don't know you at all, Scorpius… I thought I knew you."

Jeanie was smiling, her warm brown eyes narrowed into slits. She looked absolutely evil, although I knew she wouldn't hurt a fly. At least not with violence. With words, though—that was a different story entirely. She was hurting me badly enough right now that she might as well have been stabbing me in the heart with a tangible knife.

"I can't tell you," Scorpius whispered, and I strained to hear him. "I promised him that I wouldn't tell anyone if they asked because he could get in trouble."

"Him?" Jeanie asked, raising an eyebrow. Apparently, Scorpius had been talking louder than I thought, if she had been able to hear him, too. She was much farther away than I was. Perhaps my head wasn't functioning correctly now, and my ears weren't working right. "Your father?"

"I can't tell you," he repeated.

My eyes began to water, but I rolled them anyway, allowing a tear to slip from them. "Of course," I murmured, more to myself than to him. "Everything is so messed up, Scorpius. First, your father is arrested, and now I find out that you've been sneaking out. Isn't it a little strange that you've been sneaking out while this is going on? Jeanie is right."

"No, Rose, I'm not—"

"You know what?" I asked, cutting him off. It was a rhetorical question—I would give him the answer without getting a response. "I don't want to know what you've been doing. I thought seventh year would be my best year, and that it would be really enjoyable. So far, though, it's been awful. Thanks so much, Scorpius."

He sighed, and Jeanie laughed behind him before walking away. I looked at Scorpius for a second longer, and then turned on my heel. As I walked away, I heard him say, "Sorry, Rosie." I began to laugh to myself, letting some more tears spill over my eyes.

That was ironic. He started calling me _Rosie_ with the exact same sentence. And this was probably the last time he would ever call me that.

--

**Author's Note:** Oh, I am bad. I am SO mean. I know.

I also know what you're going to say. Actually, what I think some of you want me to say I can't actually put up here, since this isn't a Mature-rated fanfiction. Plus, I don't swear (I know, I'm weird. I just don't like it). But I know what you're going to say eventually! It may not be the first or second thing you'll think, but you WILL think it eventually: I should have given them more time together. Seriously, they were only together for a couple of days—I should have given them a couple of weeks!

Yeah, too bad. Bwah ha ha!

I didn't say they won't get back together, of course. Because it's very possible. Rose doesn't really hold grudge's very well, if you couldn't tell already. Plus, Scorpius and Rose were really good friends before they got together, so they're used to fights.

Then again, I didn't say they would get back together. But they COULD!

Just saying. Only I know what's going on. You're all probably mad about that. Bwah ha ha! I love being in control of a story. Because I can do anything I want! Except, of course, it has to go with my plot. Which has a beginning and an end and a middle. But no middle of the middles. If that made any sense.

Yup. Happy reading!


	15. Hypothetical Situations

**Chapter Fifteen – Hypothetical Situations**

To be entirely honest, I was too angry at the moment to be sad. I was angry with Scorpius—but, of course, I was angry with myself for getting tangled into the mess. The tears stopped flowing as quickly as they started, and for a while, I sat on a lone bench in the middle of the sidewalk and fumed. Students from Hogwarts were passing me by without a glance, smiling and laughing. I even saw Hugo and Janice walk by me to go into The Three Broomsticks, but my own brother didn't seem to notice me.

This was fine by me, though. I didn't particularly want anyone to come join me on the bench or sling a comforting arm around me. If anyone asked me what was wrong, I would probably just break down while trying to explain it, or not be able to explain it at all. Therefore, I didn't mind if people just walked by me without a care, laughing and giggling their heads off. Besides, I would rather be miserable by myself than make someone else miserable, as well.

Then again, I would much rather be miserable with Scorpius than miserable by myself. No, I couldn't think about that. I was supposed to be angry with him, not wanting him with me. Not wanting his warm, muscled arm wrapped around my body as I cried into his shoulder… Not wanting his soft lips touching mine in a way that would take all of my anger away immediately… Not wanting his beautiful gray eyes staring into mine as I spilled my heart out, letting him have all of me… I wasn't supposed to want any of that.

Maybe I had overreacted a little bit. Perhaps this was just a coincidence—he just happened to be sneaking around the castle while Muggle killings were occurring, and his father was being arrested. He had probably been doing it for years, and I just never noticed, or bothered to ask. That was it. When I was younger, my parents would ask me, "Why didn't you tell us?" when they discovered something I already knew. Then, of course, I said, "You didn't ask me!" Maybe I just didn't ask Scorpius, so he didn't bother to tell me.

Still, he was sneaking around the castle behind my back, and I had never caught him. Did that make Albus and I poor Heads? How many other students were sneaking around during the night when people were supposed to be patrolling the halls? Perhaps the prefects just let him sneak out—at least, the Slytherin prefects might have let him off the hook. I would have to interrogate everyone—and I would have to let Albus know what was going on. Scorpius had caused a previously unnecessary problem.

What was Scorpius doing sneaking out at night, anyway? There were so many possibilities. One idea stuck in my head like acid, however, and it was giving me a headache to think about; could Scorpius be sneaking out for another girl? There had always been that part of me that believed that I wasn't good enough for Scorpius, anyway. Plus, we had only come together because I told him that I loved him while I was completely demented in the head. There were plenty of beautiful girls at Hogwarts, and I had never considered myself one of them. Scorpius always got the beautiful ones.

Really, it wouldn't completely break me if I knew for a fact that Scorpius was two-timing me. Oh, I would be hurt, and I would probably never be able to forgive him—there was a wall of trust that would never be able to come back, and staying friends after something like that would be hard. I could get over it, though. I mean, it would be better for him to be cheating on me than having him doing something illegal. I would much rather know he was safe and hurting me than know he was _evil_ and hurting me.

So long as Scorpius wouldn't tell me what was going on, I would remain angry with him. The relationship would be on hiatus for now, and if he chose to be honest with me, then I would consider getting back together with him. If I chose to break it off completely, then we could attempt to resume our position as just friends. Of course, everything was awful now, and "friends" probably wasn't going to be an option. And, technically, you weren't supposed to date best friends, since being friends after that would be weird.

"Hey, Rosie, do you want some Fizzing Whizbees?" someone asked, and I blinked, looking up at Albus, who was walking around with some of his guy friends, and there was one girl who I thought Albus fancied with them. He stopped in front of me, holding out his bag of candy from Honeydukes, and I waved it away. He looked at my face, which clearly exclaimed how angry I was, and looked back at his friends. "I'm just going to find out what's going on. I'll meet you all in Zonko's."

For some reason, I thought this was meant more at the girl, Katy Ainsworth (whom I actually happened to be good friends with), than any of his other friends. Katy looked at me and waved gently, smiling as she bounced away with the other guys. Her bright blonde hair swayed in rhythm with her steps as she moved, and I wondered if any of Albus' friends liked her, as well. I wondered if Scorpius had ever liked her.

"Do you want to talk about whatever is bothering you?" Albus asked slowly, after a moments pause. I said nothing, and he sighed, pulling out a chocolate frog from his bag of Honeydukes candy. He proceeded to wave it in front of my face, thinking, perhaps, that doing this would make me want to tell him what was going on. The only thing it made me want to do was smack it out of his hand and stomp on it in the dirt. But I restrained myself. "I'll give you this chocolate frog if you tell me!"

"Um," I muttered, and I seriously considered just stopping there. My mouth had other ideas. "No, thanks, Al. That was nice of you to offer, but I probably wouldn't have taken up on it even if I wasn't angry."

"Ah, I thought you looked a little peeved," he replied, smiling at me. He moved his arm, fidgeting slightly as he sat down on the bench beside me, but he didn't touch me. His messy black hair was sticking up in every direction today, I noticed, as he ran a hand through it. "Do you mind if I guess what happened? Or at least guess what it's about?" I shrugged. "What did Scorpius do this time? You two get in more fights than _James_ and I."

I looked at him, narrowing my eyes, but the smile remained plastered on his face. Perhaps he had already had too much candy. "I have a hypothetical question for you," I said, instead of giving him the real story. "What would be the first thought going through your head if you found out that your boyfriend—or, I guess, girlfriend, in your case—was sneaking out in the middle of the night and wouldn't tell you why when you asked where he was going? What would you think she was doing?"

"The first thought?" Albus repeated, rubbing the back of his head. "Well, I would have no idea what she was doing, but my first thought would be that she was two-timing me. Of course, that really never happens… I mean, they say it always happens, but I think that's more so in books and movies than in reality. So, my next thought would be escaping. In the middle of the night, it's quieter and simpler than it is during the day. Maybe she needs to just walk around where no one can find her, or to escape from everyone else."

I blinked, surprised by his second thought. His first thought was the one I wanted to hear—then, of course, the explanation was nice, too. It made it seem like Scorpius could never do that to me. But his second thought was so much more _realistic_. Although I could never picture anyone I know walking around aimlessly in a giant castle, trying to just escape from everything, it seemed like something Scorpius might do. Plus, he was probably too embarrassed to tell me that. It seemed like a reasonable explanation.

Then, I remembered the strange coincidence. "Al, here's another hypothetical situation for you," I continued, and Albus nodded. "Same situation as last time, but this time, he's missing while Muggle killings are occurring in the middle of the night, and your girlfriend's father is arrested for having a part in them. She won't tell you what she's doing in the middle of the night, once again. What are your first thoughts?"

Albus furrowed his eyebrows and made a funny face; I didn't laugh, but it was pretty hard to keep myself from smiling. He didn't seem to notice the sudden smile on my face, and as soon as he relocked eyes with me, I wiped the smile off my face. He opened his mouth slowly, and then closed it, as if he was changing his mind. But I asked for his first thought—how could he change his mind?

"My first thought, when you explain the hypothetical situation like that, would be that she was going around killing Muggles in the middle of the night. But how could she possibly have time for that, since the nearest Muggle village is too far away for her to go in one night? If everything just happened like that, though, without someone explaining it in the way you did, my first thought would be what my second thought for the last situation was: she just needs to walk around to escape from everything."

I remembered something Scorpius had mentioned: he couldn't tell me because he promised someone—some man—that he wouldn't tell anyone. My third hypothetical situation.

"Okay, another hypothetical situation," I said, and I figured Albus was getting annoyed with all of my "hypothetical" situations. But he looked fine, almost interested, in what I was saying. "Same situation again, with everything from hypothetical situation number two, only this time, she mentions that she can't tell you because she promised some man that she couldn't."

Albus' face fell, and he considered this situation. "Well," he began, "I have no idea. Too many thoughts entered my head at once for me to pick a first one. I mean, Scorpius could have meant anything by that—oh, wait, I mean, my girlfriend could have meant anything by that. Oh, I give up. I know I haven't been entirely supportive of the whole issue going on with his father, but I can guarantee that Scorpius has nothing to do with the Muggle killings. I mean, there is no way he could."

I smiled weakly and nodded. "Thanks, Albus." I paused. "Well, in any case, do you think we could tell everyone to just watch by the dungeons to make sure than Scorpius doesn't sneak out again? Just because he's my… well… just because I know him better than most other people doesn't mean he can just sneak out without getting punished for it."

"Did you break up with him or something?" he asked, and I bit my lip.

"Kind of. We're taking a break for the moment," I replied, and Albus made an "O" with his mouth. I had simply overreacted (a lot). I never meant to kind of break up with Scorpius—Albus had helped me realize that. "But I'm going to go find him and see if he might want to end the little break and get back together. I mean, it's only been a couple of days since we official started going out…"

Albus nodded, standing up from the bench and handed me the chocolate frog he still held in his hand. "You should give him something. It may make him more sympathetic," he noted, and I rolled my eyes. All the same, I took the chocolate frog in my hands and walked in the opposite direction from Albus. He headed towards Zonko's, and I was going to start looking for Scorpius at The Three Broomsticks.

I saw Lily and Hugo right away when I entered the building, and Lily was eying someone angrily. I followed her nasty gaze down to a small table where Scorpius was sitting—with Jeanie. I narrowed my eyes, noticing that they both had a butterbeer in front of them. His was untouched, but Jeanie had almost finished hers. I had a feeling that she may have convinced him to buy them for her.

I stalked over to Lily's table and pulled her away from Michael, Janice, and Hugo without a word. She looked at me, shocked, and bit her lip. The other three were watching us with wide eyes.

"He came in here with her!" she exclaimed in a whisper, looking back at Jeanie and Scorpius anxiously. "He bought her a drink, and they sat down together at the table. He's looked a little uncomfortable, but she keeps making him laugh and smile and stuff. Plus, I keep hearing her mention your name, and then he always cuts her off and gets her to talk about something else."

"Thanks," I replied, crushing the chocolate frog in my hand. "I'm sorry I interrupted your date—and ruined it because of Scorpius. Really, I'm sorry. Don't worry about him—or me, for that matter."

Lily nodded, sitting back down at her table and immediately whispering to the other three. I headed down towards Scorpius and Jeanie, freezing in front of their table. Scorpius looked at me, looking extremely unnerved, while Jeanie just frowned and crossed her arms.

"Well, I came to apologize for overreacting, but I think I'll pass on that now," I snapped, my voice shaking nervously. "Here you go, Scorpius. Enjoy!"

I threw the crumpled chocolate frog at him, and it bounced off his chest into his lap. He looked at me incredulously, cradling the frog in his hand as he stood up. He towered over me, and I thought he was going to yell at me, but he just shook his head lamely. I rolled my eyes and turned around, walking away from his table.

"Rose, stop! Come back!" Scorpius called, but I was already out of the building. I was walking down the street, angry once again—and probably overreacting, once again. "Rose!"

He was still following me… Wow. Well, this time, I was going to give him one hell of a chase.

--

**Author's Note:** Wow, this was a short chapter. The paragraphs were longer than usual, but the chapter itself was shorter. Oh well. I tried to update quickly, but I had no idea how BUSY I was... wow.

Anyway, Rose is one angry, hormonal girl. Poor thing. I actually feel bad for her—I mean, she legit loves Scorpius, and he's being really secretive. And, as much as I love Jeanie, he probably shouldn't have bought her a butterbeer right after breaking up with his girlfriend. Hey, if I was Rose, I probably would have kicked his butt by now.

Maybe I'm just a lot meaner than Rose… Nah…

Well, I suppose I should have a disclaimer today. Everything you recognize belongs to J.K. Rowling. Everything you don't belongs to me (i.e. plot… plot… what else?). Yay!


	16. Unworthiness

**Chapter Sixteen – Unworthiness**

I had to stop running away eventually, and it ended up being sooner than I thought. I wasn't exactly "in shape," despite my small size (that was all genetics), so I didn't make it very far. I hadn't run in a really long time, and I was out of breath in less than a minute. Scorpius, however, moved quickly, and I really had to push myself to get away. I ended up running into Zonko's Joke Shop, and, hopefully, Scorpius didn't notice.

From what I saw, Scorpius _didn't_ notice. I saw him slow to a walk outside the shop and move past. I sighed a breath of relief (which was harder than I thought, considering how much I was gasping from my sprint) and spun around, looking around the store. It was nothing like my uncle's joke shop, but it wasn't bad. The shelves all gleamed with shiny new inventions, and barrels filled with the classic stuff poked out near the counters.

From above the racks spread out throughout the store, I saw messy black hair moving along them. I had forgotten that Albus had come in here. If I stayed with him, however, Scorpius probably would not bother me for the rest of the day. I had conveniently chosen a very good store to escape to. Despite the fact that I would have to explain myself to Albus, and I didn't really want to, this was perfect.

I moved swiftly around the racks, walking over to Albus' side. No one was next to him, but I could see that his friends were spread out throughout the store. He was looking at some sort of candy, but as soon as I came near him, he looked at me. I smiled as earnestly as I could, which wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. It seemed to have fooled him, since he said, "Fix everything?" in an expectant tone.

"Uh," I muttered, keeping the smile on my face as Albus put whatever it was he was holding back on the rack. "No, not really." He furrowed his eyebrows, and I knew I had to explain myself. "Well, you know how I am. I'm stubborn, and I saw him with Jeanie, and I just… I couldn't control myself. I was angry, so I ran off. He bought her a drink! This was supposed to be our day!"

I allowed my face to fall, and I felt my eyes begin to water. The mistake had been made; I was the biggest idiot in the world. Was the mistake mine? Had I just ruined something by freaking out the way I had? Had I destroyed any chance we had at fixing what I had already broken in the first place? This was all messed up, and it had been entirely my fault. Scorpius didn't do anything wrong. I was the one who had blown my top, not him.

"Rose, don't cry!" Albus exclaimed, but it was too late. I let my eyes spill over, and the tears streamed down my face like waterfalls. "Oh, Rosie, I'm sorry! This is my fault!"

I blinked in confusion, allowing more tears to slip from my eyes. I sniffled, and Albus took my elbow, pulling me out of the shop. I sincerely hoped that Scorpius had gone far enough away that he wouldn't be able to see me. Albus pulled me to a bench, sitting me down before placing himself beside me. His head slumped into his hands, cradling himself in a way that made me worry. What could possibly be his fault?

"I understand that you're going to be angry with me, Rose, but try not to hate me. If you can find it in you to forgive me, that would be wonderful," he told me. Although the tears were still flowing freely, I couldn't help but smile at this. I knew for a fact that I could never hate Albus, no matter what he did.

"Scorpius sneaks out every night because of me," he admitted, and I felt my jaw drop. At the moment, I was in total and complete awe. _Albus_ was the reason Scorpius had been sneaking out every night? I didn't know what to think about that, honestly. I was not angry at all. More so, I was confused and stunned. "He helped me out because I had something I needed to do when we were doing our rounds, so he would take over for me so my work actually got done while I was out."

So, Scorpius had not been sneaking out to meet other girls, and he hadn't been sneaking out to go kill Muggles. He had not been sneaking out to escape from anything, although he may have been doing that in the process. He had been sneaking out to help my cousin, someone whom I never would have suspected him to be helping at all.

I was a jerk. A huge jerk. A gigantic jerk. And Scorpius, the nicest person in the entire world (how could I have ever suspected of doing anything wrong—he was _the_ nicest person in the world!), didn't deserve me. I would go find him and apologize, and then I would finalize our breakup. I had done so many things wrong, and he could find someone who actually was worth fighting for. Right now, I just couldn't be that girl.

I wasn't being dramatic, despite what most people would probably think. I wasn't just saying that Scorpius didn't deserve me. A lot of girls said that out of spite, or they would say it to be theatrical. And that bothered me. Honestly, Scorpius really acted as a better person than I did, helping a person who wasn't even his friend! How could a person like that want a person like me? Really, I was doing him a favor.

"I probably owe you an explanation of why I was neglecting my duties as well," Albus continued, although I didn't really care. Which was a bit hypocritical of me, since I wanted an explanation of why Scorpius was sneaking out, but I didn't want one of why Albus was sneaking out. Still, I knew Albus would give me an explanation, anyway, and I wasn't about to stop him. Besides, the longer we sat in this spot, the more likely it was that Scorpius would come back in this direction.

"Since I couldn't just walk out in the middle of the night on some random day without someone catching me, I decided that I should probably go when I'm the only one who could really catch myself. And I wouldn't turn myself in, so it worked out well," he started, and I wasn't sure if he was joking around, or if he was serious. I just listened intently, gesturing for him to continue. "He asked me for a favor—this wasn't really my decision. You know, to sneak out of doing my rounds."

Well, that technically changed things. Because Scorpius was the one who asked Albus to skip his rounds for some reason. So, Albus was the one doing Scorpius a favor. But Scorpius still took over for him, which was really nice of him. Considering that he gave me a fit when I was trying to get him to take over for Albus when he was sick.

"Anyway, I agreed to help him out. Because the thing he wanted to do was really nice, and I couldn't possibly say no. He wanted to do something for you," Albus continued. I almost felt my heart stop. Scorpius was doing something for me all this time. I really did not deserve him. He was so out of my league. "I'm not going to tell you what, since it's not ready yet, but I will tell you that it is wonderful. And he really does care.

"Well, he said that as long as I helped him out, he would take over my rounds for me. If he found anyone, he would just tell them that he was taking over for me for that night and not to sneak out again. It wasn't a big deal, and I don't normally take points away from people, anyway. And if Scorpius got caught, I told him to tell the teacher that it was my idea. Everything would work out fine." Albus shrugged. My gaze traveled over to the crowd of people passing us by, and I looked for Scorpius. He didn't pass by.

"By the way, a teacher does know that Scorpius and I are doing this for you," Albus added. This threw me off, and I looked back at him with raised eyebrows, confused. "I mean, he doesn't exactly approve of us sneaking around in the middle of the night, but we can't do it during the day when you could suspect us. And this professor likes you, so he was willing to help out just once. He's been helping us make the thing for you, too."

Now, I wanted to know who the professor helping them out was. All of my professors liked me (not to sound cocky or anything—teachers always seemed to like me for some reason), and most of them happened to be men. Professor Longbottom, an old family friend, since he knew my father when he went to Hogwarts, probably knew what Albus and Scorpius were doing. And he was probably the one helping them make something for me.

He would never lie to me, of course, so if I asked him about it, he would definitely tell me. All I had to do was interrogate him. Although, at this point, I didn't really want to know. Whatever Scorpius was doing for me—he didn't want me to know. He had gone to a lot of trouble to make sure I didn't know about it. Now that I knew he was doing something for me, I didn't want to go and find out what it was until he was ready to give it to me.

Well, if he still wanted to give it to me. He had gone to so much trouble to make it, so obviously it was worth something to him. But I had been a jerk, and he probably didn't want me to have it anymore. He could always give it to another girl—some girl who deserved it. A beautiful girl that actually loved him.

And I _did_ love Scorpius. I loved him too much to hurt him, which was exactly what I was doing. The way he looked at me when I threw that chocolate frog at him… the way he slowed to a walk when I disappeared from his sight like he was giving up… I was hurting him, and he never did anything to deserve it. I loved him enough to let him go. The old saying was, "If you love something enough to let it go, it will always come back to you." And hopefully Scorpius would come back. At least as a friend.

"I have to find him again. I've done so many things wrong, and we haven't even been going out for that long. I have to finalize the break up," I muttered, more to myself than to Albus, but I knew he heard me. His jaw dropped slightly, and he shook his head with a powerful force before turning in his seat and grabbing my shoulders, shaking me.

"You can't do that!" he yelled, making heads turn in our direction. I stared at my cousin, wide-eyed, but I didn't say anything. "Rose, you are so oblivious to everything. You may be book smart, but you're stupid about everything else. Can't you see how much Scorpius loves you? If you broke up with him just because you think you've done things wrong, it would kill him. Maybe not literally, but it would definitely eat him up."

"But I already broke his heart. And he could have someone better, anyway. Like Jeanie. They're both in Slytherin, and they both… I don't know. They'd find something to talk about," I shrugged, pulling away from his grip.

Albus rolled his eyes. "Would you really want to hurt him anymore than he already is? His father was arrested for killing people, and you were the first good thing that happened to him. You just keep stepping on him and stepping on him, and soon, he's going to crack if you don't fix him." He sighed, looking at my horrified expression. "He loves you, and you love him, so go find him and forgive and forget."

"Rosie?" a voice said behind me, weak and pathetic sounding. I had a feeling that Albus had saw him long before he gave his speech—he was giving it for me, and he knew Scorpius would hear. So, it wasn't just for me, but it was for Scorpius as well. We both had to forgive and forget. More so me than him, though.

"Scorpius," I murmured, turning away from Albus to look at the blonde. He looked awful; his hair was windswept from running to find me, and the look on his face was eating at me. His eyes didn't shine like they usually did; instead, they looked sad, and I couldn't hold mine onto his. "I am so sorry. Albus told me why you were sneaking out—and I just got jealous when I saw you with Jeanie. I would understand if you didn't want to see me again."

"We have classes together," Scorpius said, and I furrowed my eyebrows. That seemed completely irrelevant. "I have to see you everyday." Oh, well, that made sense. But that wasn't exactly what I was talking about. I chose not to say anything. Instead, I just sighed, shaking my head.

"How much did Albus tell you?" he asked next. He looked concerned, and this almost made me smile.

I glanced at Albus, and he was smiling at me. "Not very much," I replied, turning my attention back to Scorpius. "He just told me that you were taking over his shifts because he was helping you make something for me. He didn't tell me what it was that you wanted to make me." Once I reassured him of this, his face seemed to relax.

"Well, I'm sorry I couldn't tell you. I didn't want to get Albus in trouble," he said, looking at Albus. His eyes flickered back to mine, and he held out his hand. "So, do you want to go to the Three Broomsticks? You know, to forgive and forget, as Al put it?"

I placed my palm in his, and we shook hands. I felt a smile creep onto my face, despite the fact that I wasn't exactly satisfied with this truce. "That sounds like a plan," I agreed, and Scorpius smiled back.

"Thanks, Potter," I said, spinning around to face my cousin. He smiled at me.

"Anytime, Weasley," he replied, pulling me into a hug. I was surrounded by such wonderful people, and in that moment, I didn't feel worthy of being in their presence. I allowed my face to fall, so I turned away from Scorpius and Albus so neither of them would see.

So neither of them would see how much I really hurt.

--

**Author's Note:** Okay, so, obviously this took a really long time to get out. And it isn't even that great a chapter. I apologize for that—it is my fault entirely, and I am going to admit that.

But! I did work really hard to get this chapter out as soon as possible. Actually, you guys and gals are really lucky that I got this out so _fast_. I can't even believe how busy I've been!

So, to make it up to you guys, I think I'm going to make a website with an update schedule and everything. Not some lame freewebs thing, either. Like, a real website. And I'll give everyone the link to it once I make it. Except, it might be after I finish this, since I don't know how to publish a site, yet...

And I'll update faster. Hopefully.

I apologize again for the delay! But I'll try to update faster. I hope I still have fans!


	17. Astrology and Horoscopes

**Chapter Seventeen – Astrology and Horoscopes**

Scorpius had been completely serious when he suggested to go with Albus' plan to "forgive and forget". Not only did we forgive each other (him for being devious, me for being downright stupid and not trusting him), but we also forgot. At least, Scorpius did. He would not touch me or come within spitting distance of me. Instead, he stayed away, watching me only from the corner of his eye, sure not to make eye contact for more than a second at a time.

I kept my eyes locked on his face, waiting for the precious few moments in which we actually did catch each other's eyes and hoping that he would not pull them away. Every time, however, disappointment graced my presence. Nothing I could do or say could fix this at the moment. Time would heal all wounds, I guessed, although I wished time would move just a little faster. I missed my friend.

Not to mention, Divination and Potions nearly killed me everyday. As the week progressed, I sat at the table beside Scorpius in Potions, (though he moved his chair as far away from me as he could get, so as not to bump elbows as we did so often before this) waiting for him to say something to me. Perhaps a "How many times did you stir counterclockwise?" or a "Could I borrow some of your lacewing?" Now, if he needed to borrow something, he went up to the front of the class and asked the teacher. If he needed to know how many times to stir, he turned to the person on his other side and asked.

Divination, amazingly, was worse. At least in Potions we were supposed to be quiet (since we had to do work and all), but in Divination, talking usually had a key role. After all, didn't "discussion" usually require quite a bit of talking? Scorpius had none of that. Our discussion consisted of him opening his dream journal and closing his eyes, as if hoping to fall asleep and have a miraculous dream about something. I seriously doubted anything would happen.

"Scorpius, this is ridiculous. We're supposed to be having a discussion on the relevance of astrology to the true Divination art form," I finally snapped, reaching across the table to shut his dream journal. He opened one eye and looked at me, if only for a second, before opening the other one and glancing away. "If you aren't going to talk to me as a friend, you might as well talk to me as a peer so you can get a grade."

This made him look at me (for more than a second). His mouth dropped a little, and I almost thought he was going to say something to me. Unfortunately, he shut his mouth as quickly as he had opened it, and he nodded at me. Despite my yearning for him to look at me, I was the one who broke the eye contact this time. My eyes had begun to water, and I wasn't about to let him see me cry. He had nodded in agreement! He would talk to me only as a peer, not a friend.

"Right," I choked, before managing to find my voice. Scorpius blinked, taken aback as he realized what he had done to me. His head fell, and he looked at his twiddling thumbs on top of the desk. "Well, astrology is the study of the affects of celestial bodies on human and earthly affairs, basically. Most of the time it involves horoscopes, which seem to provide an upcoming warning of the future for you, whether good or bad."

"But the people who write the horoscopes aren't necessarily Seers. I mean, Muggles have astrologers making horoscopes for them in their newspapers, but how accurate can they be?" Scorpius inputted, the sound of his voice making me smile; I hadn't heard it in so long (a week now?). "It couldn't be a true form of Divination because most of it is made up. The real stuff would just be considered a prophecy, right? And all of the horoscopes depend on your zodiac symbol. How could the same thing happen to that many people?"

"Chiromancy is sometimes considered a form of astrology, and we consider that to be a part of Divination." His eyes darkened, narrowing at me. He was beginning to get angry at me—the angrier he got, the more he'd argue, which meant the more he'd talk to me. This conversation would most likely leave the classroom with us. I just had to prove myself right, and he would try to disprove me. "People with the same zodiac sign typically have similar personalities, so they things that happen to them would be similar. And just like predictions, horoscopes wouldn't always be right."

"Horoscopes are wrong nine times out of ten," he retorted, and I chuckled.

"You just pulled that statistic out of your arse, didn't you?" I hissed, quietly enough so Professor Firenze would not hear me, but loud enough so Scorpius would. He inhaled sharply, leaning back in his chair so he was further away from me again. His arms folded across his chest, and for a moment, I saw his eleven-year-old self, immature and never wrong. "I don't read my horoscope very often, but whenever I do, it's usually close to what actually happens to me."

An idea popped into my head suddenly, and I smiled. "You know what? I have a copy of the _Daily Prophet_ with me, and they have the horoscopes in the back. Why don't I read you yours? We'll see if any of the stuff happens to you today. Maybe it will not happen exactly as it states, but it may happen in a form of it," I looked at him piercingly, and for a moment, I thought he was going to refuse. But his head fell and rose in a nod, and my stomach rolled excitedly.

I yanked the _Daily Prophet_ out of my bag and flattened it on the table. Since I would be looking at the horoscopes, I doubted Professor Firenze would have any objections to what I was doing. Well… maybe he would have objections to some of what I was about to do, but for the most part, I was safe. Opening to horoscope section, I raised the paper in front of my face so Scorpius couldn't see myself or the horoscopes, and I cleared my throat.

"Okay, so you're a Scorpio," I started, not bothering to actually find it on the list of horoscopes—his parents had been so creative when they were naming him, I discovered. "Today is a new day, and you can fix what you broke. You may be facing some economical issues, and you have to step up and take responsibility. Your loved ones will respect you. You will also fix any problems you may be having with your loved ones and stop acting selfishly as they were to you."

All right, so the truth was, I made the entire horoscope up, though it was probably obvious. Still, as I folded the paper up and laid it flat on the table again, I noticed that Scorpius' face was horrorstruck, and I thought for a second that he would actually _talk_ to me, rather than just tolerate me. Perhaps he believed my words, and he would stop being so selfish, since he was hurting me by trying to save himself. And, of course, I had been the one to act selfishly earlier, so I had to throw that part in there. And I couldn't make it seem too obvious of what I was doing, so I threw in the part about the economical issues. He'd never know.

"Well," I said, shrugging after Scorpius said nothing, "we'll just have to wait and see what happens. Personally, I'm betting that it will come true to an extent. You have to actually listen to the words and understand them, and I'm thinking you do." My eyes fell on his hard, and I noticed his Adam's apple bounce as he swallowed. He was definitely planning on saying something.

Of course, this something wasn't exactly what I had meant. "Can I see it? The horoscope, I mean? I just want to make sure you aren't making this up." My heart almost stopped, and I felt the paper crunch in my fingers as I clutched it tightly. He made a swift recovery, not looking as nervous as he said this. It was as if he really thought I was making it up—but it had made him nervous, anyway. Wonderful.

I would show it to him, of course. I knew a simple spell to change minor things like that one horoscope. I whisked my wand out under the table and pointed it at the newspaper, holding it up in front of my face again so Scorpius couldn't see me (though he would probably suspect me again after this—unless he didn't know I knew this word, since I learned it outside of class). I muttered the spell so quietly that I wasn't sure words had come out of my mouth at all. But I saw the words forming into different words on the paper, and I smiled. It had worked!

I passed the newspaper over to Scorpius, and he looked down at his horoscope, scanning it through once, and his eyes moved back up the page, rereading the article. "All right, then," he muttered, setting the _Daily Prophet_ back down without folding it back up and sliding it across the table back to me. "I bet that the horoscope is wrong. Because I am not acting selfishly at all. I'm trying to protect all of my loved ones, and even if it's hurting them emotionally in the process, at least they're okay physically."

This, again, was not what I had expected. I blinked, furrowing my eyebrows and shaking my head. "What? You're wrong, Scorpius, you are so wrong. You have no idea how much you're hurting _me_," I said, a little too loudly. The noisiness that once floated in the air of the room now disappeared, and I knew multiple eyes were sitting on my back. After a moment of silence, people appeared to get back to work, but Scorpius (and I) still looked uncomfortable.

"You're the one that didn't trust me in the first place. I figured you needed a little space after what happened. I mean, I said I would forgive and forget, but I really meant that I would _forgive_ and _forget_. We were never meant to be together, anyway. And you broke up with me, so I don't know why you're complaining," Scorpius retorted, and I felt my jaw drop.

"Mental!" I exclaimed as quietly as I could. "You're crazy. I never actually broke up with you. And I don't need any space. I apologized, I gave you a little time, and now I want this to be fixed. Can you please stop acting so stupidly?"

He rolled his eyes, and a smirk grew onto his face. "You're the stupid one," he replied, and I narrowed my eyes. He reached across the table and pointed down to the horoscope. "You probably should have read what you changed, since it's not the horoscope you gave me. You just reorganized the words into gibberish."

I looked down at my changes, biting my lip. It definitely was not what I had read to him—in fact, the words appeared so scrambled that I could not even make out a sentence. It was just too hard to read. Scorpius, unfortunately, had caught me. He knew that I had made the entire horoscope up, and yet, he still played a long for a tiny bit. And he had seemed genuinely nervous before I gave him the newspaper. What was going on?

"Okay, okay, so you caught me," I said, raising my hands in surrender. He looked dissatisfied, as if I needed to wave around a little white flag before he accepted my admittance of defeat. "I made the entire thing up so you might actually be pressured into saying something to me. But was it really such a bad idea? I mean, you actually managed to spit something out at me, despite what I think was your best effort not to talk to me. I'd rather be friends than nothing, you know."

The corner of his mouth flickered. "I'd rather be something than friends," he admitted, and my stomach flipped inside of me. A smile grew on my face, but his face remained serious. "I still don't agree that astrology is really a part of Divination. Your pathetic attempt at writing a horoscope proved me right."

I rolled my eyes. "You're so wrong," I muttered. I knew then that everything was going to be all right. In a sense, of course. Draco Malfoy was still under arrest for killing Muggles, which I was still unsure about whether he had or had not (I still didn't know who that man he was talking to in my dream was), and things would still be a little awkward between Scorpius and I. But for the most part, things would be okay.

Of course, that was before everything I knew came crashing down on me.

**Author's Note:** So, now you can see that things are really… annoying in relationships. One day you're mad at each other, the next you love each other, then you hate each other again, then you love each other again, etc. It's a back and forth thing.

I hope that makes sense. And I hope it's realistic! Since that's what I want this fanfiction to be.

The beginning of this chapter was really wonderful for me. The English class I'm taking is really helping out with all the "show-don't-tell" stuff, which always appeared to be my biggest issue, I just didn't know it, and it seemed to work in the beginning. By the end I definitely started telling a lot more than showing. Oh well. It's a work in progress.

Honestly, I have no idea how long this fanfiction will be anymore. I know what's going to happen, of course, but I can't figure out how many chapters it will take to do it. This will most likely be over twenty chapters. There's a lot more that has to happen. I'm going to try to update on weekends now, but we'll see.

Anyway, that's about all I have to say. Thanks!


	18. Gossipmongers

**Chapter Eighteen – Gossipmongers**

The press officially released the news concerning Draco Malfoy.

Scorpius, having been cut off from his family for quite a few days, came running toward me with _The Daily Prophet_ under his arm the day the article came out. His mother chose to keep him out of the loop for several reasons: one, she didn't want him to be concerned about his father; two, she wanted him to focus on his studies; and three, she didn't want other people to know what was going on.

This, of course, meant that everyone in the entire school already knew what happened to Draco Malfoy and started vicious rumours about Scorpius. Vicious rumours that I disputed but didn't necessarily disagree with. Though I knew exactly what Scorpius was sneaking out to do (well, not _exactly_, but I knew he was doing something for me), certain things kept me wary. Scorpius' lack of emotion the day _The Daily Prophet_ came out with the article about his father, for one, concerned me.

He immediately thrust the article at me after running with it to find me, but his face showed nothing. His eyes cold and distant, I wondered what exactly the article said and why Scorpius seemed so unresponsive. As I skimmed through the article, reading every single word, I glanced up every so often to look at Scorpius, to see if his expression changed. It never did.

Draco Malfoy had been arrested for several charges, including "manslaughter with an Unforgivable Curse, use of magic before a Muggle, two first degree murders, and use of illegal magic". Reading through, most of the descriptions of the events seemed highly unbelievable and over-exaggerated, such as the death of a Muggle at one o'clock in the morning with over fifty witnesses reporting they saw Mr. Malfoy. Why would fifty people be up on the streets in a rural town at one o'clock in the morning? The writer of the article needed to get their facts straight, if you asked me.

Upon completion of reading the article, I handed it back to Scorpius, hoping to see some change in his expression. Still, it lay like stone, unchanged, stoic. Sliding my hands to my hips, I raised an eyebrow at him, hoping to make him realize his behaviour. His eyes caught mine, finally gaining some sort of emotion in their grey depths, and he smiled. This, I noted, was not a reasonable reaction.

"Your father is going to jail." I barely felt my lips say the words, but I heard them come out of me. Scorpius, still smiling, shrugged, and turned to walk away from me. People turned to look at him as he passed them in the hallway, immediately whispering before he was even out of earshot. Narrowing my eyes at the students, I followed Scorpius down the hall, shaking my head disappointedly. Something strange was happening at Hogwarts.

"My dad's an Auror, and he said Harry Potter and Ron Weasley are sticking up for Scorpius's dad. Everyone is freaking out about that in the office, apparently. Everyone trusts Harry Potter and Ron Weasley, but there's something real fishy about the fact that they're supporting Malfoy so much. My dad said the other Aurors are trying to reason with Potter and Weasley, but no one is getting through to them," I heard one student whispering as I passed them. Hearing my uncle and my dad's names, I froze, turning back around and following the two gossipers from a safe distance.

The other student, a blonde fifth year, looked appalled. "You think it's because Weasley's daughter is dating Scorpius? I mean, can you imagine how bad it would look if Rose and Scorpius were dating when Mr. Malfoy is in jail? Especially for charges like _that_." My jaw dropped, and, holding in a gasp, I covered my mouth with my hand. "No wonder Weasley's sticking up for him. And obviously, if Weasley is, then Potter will, too."

"What is happening to honest politics?" the first student, a dark-haired sixth year, asked, shaking his head. "Malfoy is _obviously_ guilty—no one can save him if there were over fifty witnesses for that one murder. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Scorpius turned out to be one of these new 'Death Eater' people. You've heard the rumours, right? He's been sneaking out late at night. Nobody knows where he's been going."

"Yeah, but Scorpius seems like a good guy. And Rose wouldn't be dating him if he wasn't," the blonde replied, and I wanted to hug her for sticking up for Scorpius. Of course, I wanted to slap her for attacking my dad and my uncle with her rude comments, too. "I don't know him very well, nor do I know Rose Weasley, but I know that they're good students. Good students just don't go around killing people."

Wrong. The dark-haired sixth year seemed to know what I was thinking, since he waggled a finger at the girl. "No, You-Know-Who was a good student, apparently. And he went around killing _a lot_ of people," he exclaimed, sighing exasperatedly. "Either way, Scorpius has to know there are rumours going around about him. You'd think he'd stop sneaking around. But Jennifer Jenkins said that she saw him leaving the Slytherin common room after midnight last night. Why would he still go around after dark if he wasn't doing something bad? It just seems strange to me."

The blonde nodded in agreement. "Yeah, you're right."

I tapped one of the blonde's shoulders, putting my hands back on my hips as the two turned to face me. The smiles on their faces fell as they met my narrowed eyes, blushes rising to both of their faces. They darted their eyes away, looking to the floor in embarrassment, and I shook my head.

"Yeah, next time look around before you start talking about people. Especially when those people are the people I care about," I snapped, and they nodded enthusiastically. "What houses are you two in?"

"Hufflepuff," the girl said, as the other replied, "Ravenclaw."

"Hmm." I looked the two over once again, and the dark-haired student raised his eyes to mine. "Well, I personally would have thought that the two of you would have more brains and common courtesy to talk about people behind their backs, but I guess I shouldn't judge anyone by their houses. Because I would be wrong." The blonde's lip trembled, and the boy dropped his eyes back to the floor. "Before you want to spread more rumours and talk about people, think about what you're doing. Have a nice day."

I turned around and walked away in the direction of Scorpius, again, but not without hearing the girl say, "See? I told you she's nice! I thought for sure she would have taken points from us..."

"Yeah, real nice... that's why she yelled at us."

I rolled my eyes, finding my way to the end of the hallway, where it either turned left of went into the library. I contemplated this, wondering which direction I should go—which way Scorpius would have gone. I figured my best bet was to go into the library; it was a dead end, anyway, so if he wasn't there, then I could just go the other direction. If he was in the library, then that would be even better.

Once inside the book-filled room, I glanced down each row of shelves, looking for the spot where Scorpius might be hiding. In the back of the library, near the restricted section, I found a very blonde boy sitting at a desk with a book—one a couple sizes larger than his head—in front of his face. _Spells for a Change_, the title read. I reached out and lowered the book, seeing a disgruntled Scorpius glaring up at me, a _Daily Prophet_ on his lap. I pulled the book out of his hands and placed it on the desk.

"Scorpius, what are you doing?" I wondered aloud, taking the empty chair beside him and situating myself in it.

He furrowed his eyebrows, looking at me with a new dazed expression. "What'd you mean?" he questioned, and I motioned toward the newspaper sitting on his lap. He glanced down, looking up with an even more confused face. "I'm holding it?" It was a question, not a response, and I pulled the paper away from him. Unfolding it, I found it opened to the page with Draco Malfoy's article. I held it to Scorpius' face.

"Oh." He narrowed his eyes, snatching the newspaper back and slamming on top of _Spells for a Change_. "Did you even look at all the evidence they have against him? My father is _going to jail_. Even if your dad and your uncle are trying to help him, no one trusts him. Especially with his past history. Merlin, Rose, there were fifty bloody witnesses for that one Muggle's death. Fifty. And when they all testify, they're just going to send my dad away."

I shook my head furiously, sending my red hair flying around me. "How could they possibly have fifty witnesses if the Muggle was killed at one o'clock in the morning? Why are there fifty people awake at that hour?" I asked him, and he shrugged. "It was a rural area. That just seems really suspicious, if you ask me. They have _nothing_ on your father, Scorpius. _Nothing_. And my dad is going to take care of it. Just watch. Your dad'll be fine."

"What about us?" he snapped, and I winced, closing my eyes for a moment before looking back at Scorpius. His eyes pointed to the article, not at me, and I sighed. "Have you heard what people have been saying about me?"

He glanced back at me only to see my response, and as I nodded, he turned his head away. I pictured the two students in my head, one defending Scorpius for only a moment while the other shot him down. I thought about all of the rumours I had heard travel through the halls during the morning, and now, only after a couple of hours, everyone knew what Scorpius was doing at night. Or they didn't know; they assumed they knew, but they were wrong.

"People are saying that I've been helping my dad out with all of this—Jeanie even said something, that day... you remember." He kept his eyes away from me especially for that fact. "You believed her, too. I'm not going to go around to every single student in this school and tell them what I've really been doing at night. I don't have to stick up for myself. It's just that... everybody has heard the rumours about me, even the teachers. They look at me like I'm diseased."

"Oh, Scorpius, no, they don't," I disagreed, but on the inside, I knew he was right. I'd seen the looks he'd received as he walked down the hallway away from me. I knew the teachers would join in on the gossip and go against Scorpius.

"Yes, they do." He grabbed one of my hands, turning it palm up, touching the lines traveling across it. "I've seen the looks people have given you, too." His fingers moved across my life line, skimming it before moving to my heart line. His eyes followed his fingers, but I stared at his face, frowning. "I've heard what they're saying about you, and you don't deserve that. Do you know what they've said about you? Do you, Rosie?"

I clenched the fingers in my other hand, forming a fist as I thought about the blonde and dark-haired students again. "Just that my dad is only sticking up for your dad because it would look bad if I was dating you and your dad was in Azkaban," I admitted, shaking my head again. "I know that's not true. My dad and Uncle Harry know your dad, and they know that he wouldn't hurt anyone. Your dad might have been told to do some bad things back when Voldemort was around, but he never really did anything bad. My dad knows that your dad would never be pulled back into something like this."

I wasn't entirely sure that Scorpius heard me, since he said, instead of a response to my last point, "People are saying that you're actually the brains of the operation. Everyone knows how smart you are, and they're saying that you're the one giving orders inside the castle. They said that instead of doing rounds at night, you go with me and help these... Death Eater wannabes. They said you're smart enough to find a way out of the castle and smart enough to not get caught."

I rolled my eyes, smiling smugly. "They're just jealous," I joked, but Scorpius didn't laugh. His fingers stopped tracing the lines on my hand, and now he grabbed it tightly, pulling me closer to him. "Scorpius... I don't want you to listen to those people. They're just a bunch of gossipers."

"But they're talking about _you_." He used his free hand to reach forward to brush my hair behind my ears. I remained silent, staring into his cool eyes. "They can talk about me all they want. Whatever. But when they start talking about you, that's when I get defensive. That's when they better watch what they say."

"Hey, I can handle it, okay? I don't want you to be the one to get in trouble for kicking someone's arse. I'll do that," I joked again, but he still remained serious. I dropped the smile off my face, shaking my head. "For the record, Scorpius, I don't think it's such a good idea for you to sneak out anymore, though. Especially if teacher's are in on the gossip. They'll be watching you."

"Yeah, well, I'm not doing anything bad. Let them talk. I'll just be giving into them if I stop sneaking out, and then they'll be even more suspicious," he pointed out, and I was taken aback.

I nodded. "You're right." Taking Scorpius's free hand with mine, I flipped to his palm and looked at the lines. "I think your dad will be okay. That's a load of bull, that evidence is. Uncle Harry and my dad will take care of everything."

I smiled reassuringly at Scorpius, but even then, I wasn't confident with what I was saying. As the week ended, the gossip still flying off tongues and the looks still glaringly obvious, the trial came to a close. Despite Draco Malfoy pleading not guilty to all charges, the Wizengamot sent him to Azkaban with two life sentences.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

**Author's Note:** So, I finally updated. I know, I know, you're probably all very upset with me, but I have a life. I do. And I don't always have time to write fanfiction, especially when I'm more concerned about other pieces of writing.

Even so, I finished another chapter! Aren't you all happy for me? And I'm almost at 50,000 words. This is almost a novel! _Great Gatsby_ length, but still. That was a great book. Short novels are still good novels. Hopefully this one fits into that category. Especially considering how upset you all must be with me.

It was kind of an abrupt ending, but I think it's almost better that way. It makes you really wonder what happened _and_ it really makes you pay attention. That important piece of information is just slipped in there, so it's easy to miss (even though it _is_ the last sentence of the chapter).

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed it! Hopefully I'll be able to throw in a couple more chapters before school starts. But you never know.

Also, please review! I know I had reviews on all of those chapters that say 0, and they just disappeared... I know they existed. So, please review! It's how I learn best! Good ol' constructive criticism!


	19. Silence

**Chapter Nineteen – Silence**

The looks stopped; the school fell silent.

The conclusion of Draco Malfoy's trial seemed to be the end-all of the gossip in the school, as though this finally solved everything. With Mr. Malfoy in jail, Scorpius and I were set free, if only because people were certain that our game was over. Scorpius went on with his life like nothing happened to his family, while the mastermind, fallen without her comrades to do her dirty work, withdrew with full cowardice into her shell, leaving nothing behind.

And in a way, I did retreat into myself. Though I truly was no mastermind behind the project, I felt partially responsible for Mr. Malfoy's fate. I could have pushed my father harder, forced him to protect him more, explained the idiocy of the whole event in layman's terms, and even gotten involved in the trial. Yet I sat back, relaxed while I was safe, watched as Scorpius suffered. Nothing I did prevented this outcome, and perhaps I only helped it progress. Now, I fell into myself, reflecting on my wrong-doings and hiding from Scorpius.

I sat in the Divination room, staring at the crystal ball in the center of the floor. Faces popped in and out, voices whispering as they passed by, but I remained motionless beside it. Professor Firenze allowed me to stay in the classroom, without a word giving his consent. After taking one look at me, he nodded and hurried away to wherever he went when he wasn't in the classroom. I was just grateful that he wasn't one of those teachers that wanted to "talk" when something was wrong. I needed peace.

"Rose?"

I continued to stare at the crystal ball in front of me, focusing on the faces and whispers, not bothering to look at the person who was addressing me. I could tell who it was, anyway. He had repeatedly been to the Divination classroom to check up on me, coming once every hour or so. Had there been classes today, I probably wouldn't have hid, but seeing as there was no reason to be with everyone else, I didn't find it necessary to mingle. He persisted anyway, trying to drag me out of myself but to no prevail.

"Rose, come one, it's time for dinner. You haven't eaten anything all day. Are you trying to starve yourself?" He didn't move closer to me; he didn't touch me; he didn't reach out to me from where he stood. I heard no hint of movement other than a rising and falling of his chest as he took deep, calm breaths. He was not going to force me to come with him, and I wasn't expecting him to. He was probably too scared of my possible reaction to force me, but at least he was trying.

"Rosie… Rosie, please come eat!" He was begging now, sounding weak, and I half-expected him to get on his knees and plead with me. My other half was right, though; he stayed frozen in his spot, his reflection in the crystal ball not moving. I closed my eyes, refusing to look at him, and focused on my thoughts, instead. How was I going to see Scorpius again? Did I not expect this to ruin everything? Was I too naïve to realize it?

Then, with the ruffling of fabric touching fabric, I heard a movement. I kept my eyes shut, squeezing them even more tightly than before. Maybe Hugo was leaving, giving up on me, as he rightly should. I didn't respond to him all day, and I wasn't about to respond to him now. Yes, he was my brother, but that didn't mean I had to obey him. I was the older one, here.

"Get up," a different voice, one older than Hugo's, commanded, but I only shifted my head to turn my ears away from the noise. I didn't need my whole family to come in and order me around. At least Hugo was polite about it; Albus was just being rude.

Then, grabbing my arm, Albus pulled me to me feet, and I opened my eyes to glare at him. "Stop it. You're being a baby." He returned my glare with narrowed eyes of his own, looking disgusted and annoyed. "Rose, you're going to go downstairs to the Great Hall, you're going to sit down with Scorpius, you're going to stop hiding from everyone just because you're scared of them, and you're going to eat. You're going to stop being afraid because you're a Gryffindor. You're supposed to be brave. You're supposed to stand up for yourself instead of making your family do it for you."

Something snapped in my head, and I pulled out my wand, pointing it at my cousin. He didn't even flinch, as though he expected this to happen, but Hugo whimpered, quietly reaching for his wand. Albus didn't reach for his, though, and I didn't lower my wand.

"Shut up, you… you…" I couldn't find a word suitable enough to call him. I was so furious now that the whisperings from the crystal ball were now screaming in my head, all yelling at once, and I couldn't understand a word of it. "Do you even know what I did? Nothing! That's what! I could have stopped this entire thing from happening by telling your dad everything I inferred! I could have saved Scorpius' father, my dad and your dad, myself, from everything everyone said! And now that it's stopped, it's like…" I shuddered, my whole body shivering. "No one even cares that I did it. I did it!"

The eyes in front of me lightened, looking worried now. Albus removed my wand from my hand, sliding it away from my grip with ease; I didn't care anymore. "What are you talking about? Did what?"

"What?" I asked, and Albus looked back at Hugo. Something wasn't right here.

"Are you okay, Rosie?" Hugo walked closer to me, but he kept his wand out, pointing it at me. I felt uncomfortable, dizzy, and the screaming in my head kept getting louder and louder. I turned around, looking at the crystal ball, faces passing through like it was a train moving through the station. All I could hear now were the voices, and all I could see were those faces, plastered in my head, screaming in my ears.

And then, silence.

"_I swear, I didn't do it. I thought you were sticking up for me. I thought you understood that I wouldn't do anything having to do with You-Know-Who again. Even if he is gone."_

_The cloaked man crossed his arms, pacing back and forth in front of the cell in Azkaban. Draco Malfoy looked the same as always, blond and annoyed, but fear passed through his face for a split second. The cloaked man noticed this, stopping in his tracks and facing Malfoy for a moment before resuming his pacing. He said nothing and did not need to, but Malfoy, impatient as ever, clutched his cell bars and stuck his head out through them._

"_We had a deal. You find the real murderers…" He paused. The other side of the bargain had not been decided, but Malfoy could offer up any reward. He had all the money he needed and more—inherited, of course. But the cloaked man didn't really need the money; he had enough of his own. Surely Malfoy would be able to pay the cloaked man back, anyway. He owed him._

"_Yes, I'll find them." The voice, muffled beneath the cloak, seemed to whisper the words, though no one else bothered to eavesdrop. The man stopped pacing once more, turning to face Malfoy. "Five Muggles dead, Malfoy. Only two wizards were arrested. You and one other man, whom we proved innocent. You're the only person we have right now. Can you explain why that is? Why no one else is popping up? We're not completely incompetent, Malfoy, despite your thinking so. We don't even have any leads."_

_Malfoy looked even more annoyed now, his face scrunching up into a twisted mess. "You're just not looking in the right spots, I suppose. I mean, people framed me, and they did a damn good job, didn't they?" He paused again, looking for some sort of sympathy from the cloaked man. He received none. "Look, I don't know where the people, or person, who did it is. If I did, I wouldn't be sitting in jail. I would be testifying against him in court. All I know is that I didn't do it, and you believed me up until five minutes ago. Why have you stopped?"_

_The cloaked man unfolded his arms and moved his hands to his pockets. "Your son…" There was a smile beneath the hood._

_This conversation seemed far too familiar to Malfoy, and he furrowed his eyebrows. "Right." He ran his hand through his hair. That seemed familiar, too. "Scorpius."_

_Something wasn't right here._

"_People talk, some people listen, some people ignore it," the cloaked man said, his muffled voice ringing out stronger now. "It's my job to listen, to take action. Some students at Hogwarts have written to the Aurors to inform us of a certain Scorpius Malfoy sneaking out after dark and heading off to the grounds. Perhaps off them. We wrote to the professors and told them to keep an eye on him and to watch the dungeons at night. He was caught the other night sneaking out."_

_Malfoy removed his hands from the bars and backed away, looking disturbed. "He wasn't doing anything wrong, I'm sure of it."_

"_Neville Longbottom stood up for him, told the Headmaster that he and Scorpius were working on a project at night for Herbology." The cloaked man began pacing a third time, and Malfoy now appeared disgusted. "Needless to say, the project was terminated, at least during the night. Scorpius hasn't been caught the past few nights, but I'm curious as to how long this will last. I do not doubt Neville. I believe him… he would never stand up for your son if it wasn't true. All I'm wondering is whether or not your son has another project off school grounds during the night. No one is watching the dungeons anymore."_

_Silence._

"_What about Rose, hmm?" Malfoy sneered now, and the cloaked man froze in his tracks. "If my son is involved, I can almost guarantee that she is, too."_

"_You're wrong. She's far too intelligent to get involved. And she knows all about what happened to the Death Eaters last time." Malfoy didn't look convinced. "She's the one advocating for you at Hogwarts, according to Neville. Your son isn't even sticking up for you anymore, but Rose is. Would she be trying to set you free if she was involved? Would she have framed you if she was a part of this? Her boyfriend's father? I don't think so."_

_Malfoy moved towards the bars once more, leaning his body against them and grinning. "No one can say anything against her and have a basis for it. She's untouchable." His sly look appeared to bother the cloaked man, and the man tightened his gloved hands. "But… from what I understand, she is Head Girl. And isn't Albus the Head Boy? If she snuck off the grounds, he wouldn't turn in his own cousin, would he? She has the ability to get away each night… doing rounds and such. If she wanted to get away, she could, couldn't she?"_

"_She wouldn't."_

"_Maybe she wouldn't." Malfoy shrugged. "But isn't it also true that she is particularly gifted in Divination? Don't you find that strange, considering her mother and father both lack talent in that subject? Don't you find it strange that she is so gifted, but her parents aren't?"_

_The cloaked man tightened his hands even more, the leather of the gloves squeaking against itself. "It doesn't have to be inherited. She could just be gifted in Divination. Maybe she is a Seer… maybe Firenze is just a really good professor. She's good at all of her subjects."_

"_Scorpius told me she has very vivid dreams. Very accurate, vivid dreams."_

"_What does this have to do with anything, Malfoy? I've heard the same thing, but I don't think I'm feeling quite as enlightened as you apparently are," the cloaked man snapped, the muffled voice becoming clearer and angrier._

"_What if she did it… but she was sleepwalking? Usually you have to be in REM to have such clear dreams, I think, but since Rose is gifted… maybe she doesn't have to be. Maybe she could be sleepwalking and experiencing all of these dreams. And maybe they're telling her what to do."_

_The cloaked man laughed, chuckling quietly at first, but then laughing insanely, as if he had never heard anything funnier in his life. "That's good, Malfoy."_

_Something wasn't right here._

_Silence._

"Hey, look, she's finally waking up. Someone go grab that glass of water for her, and grab that plate of food, too. She looks like hell. And someone grab her something cool to put on her head—this washcloth has gotten warm now." The firmness of the voice disappeared, and now the voice sounded softer, more concerned. "Rosie, how are you feeling? Are you okay? You scared the living daylights out of Hugo and me."

I sat up, immediately knowing that this was a mistake. Collapsing back against whatever I was laying on—something soft and squishy, but definitely not a bed—I kept my eyes shut. Opening my eyes and seeing everyone crowded around me trying to see if I was okay did not sound like a good idea at the moment. In fact, it didn't sound like a good idea ever.

I heard tiny footsteps approach me. "Thanks, Lily." Albus spoke much more lightly than he had to me earlier. That much I remembered, if nothing else. What _had_ happened? Why was everyone here, when I was supposed to be hiding? Where did all of those voices go… and the faces? They all disappeared from my head, and the only sounds I heard now were the voices of my family and the shuffling of feet.

"Drink this, Rose." He helped me sit up, and I finally managed to open my eyes. Albus was holding a glass of water out to me, while everyone else (just Hugo and Lily, actually) ran around the common room trying to get stuff for me. How did they get me to this couch, anyway? Wasn't I in the Divination room?

"What happened?"

Hugo came to my side with a wet towel. Placing it on my forehead—more like forcing it on me, actually, since it was cold and wet, and the rest of me was getting soaked—he kneeled down on the floor.

"You kind of… had a spasm or something. Just kind of shuddered and dropped…" Hugo looked disturbed to be telling me this, but I felt far more disturbed hearing it. Shuddered and dropped? It sounded horrible like that, but thinking about it more carefully, I probably just fainted. I hadn't eaten anything all day, after all.

"Actually, you screamed, 'I did it!' before you passed out," Albus added, and Hugo blushed; he obviously wanted to hide that detail from me. "Though, I'm curious, do you actually know why you screamed that? What did you do? You were talking about how you could have stopped Draco Malfoy from going to jail, but then you just yelled that you did 'it'."

"Oh…" I shook my head, downing the water that Lily brought over. Swallowing, I looked at my cousin and my brother, shrugging. "I don't know. Maybe I was just a little confused. I had been staring at that crystal ball all day, and these faces kept on talking to me. First, they whispered, but I think they started screaming at me. I was probably just disoriented."

Albus blinked. "Faces and voices? In the crystal ball?"

"It's nothing." I smiled at him, trying to reassure my worrying cousin. That was all he ever did. Worry, worry, worry. He needed to just get away from me for a couple of days and sleep. He would be on cloud nine after that.

"Um, Rose, that doesn't sound—"

"It's nothing," I replied, interrupting him but remaining calm. "I've always been able to see things in the crystal ball, and sometimes whatever is there talks. Besides, you were yelling at me, weren't you, Albus? I was probably just getting upset and shouted whatever came to mind. I didn't mean anything by it."

Neither Albus nor Hugo looked convinced. Nor was I convinced by my own explanation. Sure, the voices had come from the crystal ball, and the faces that had been running through my mind had, as well. But something beyond my knowing was happening. Something worse than what I knew was happening. Something wasn't right.

_Chaos_.

* * *

**Author's Note:** No, I have not abandoned this. No, I am not going to leave you hanging. No, I will not give up on this just because I have another Rose/Scorpius fanfiction going. Finally, yes, this will be finished someday. I can't promise you when. But I can promise you it will be completed.

I know I sometimes take a long time to update. Sometimes I update too fast and people miss things. (It's usually the former… I know.) I sincerely apologize for that. But you just have to stick with me because I promise the end result will be great. I'm sure it's frustrating, waiting months and months for an update. In fact, I know how that feels. You probably think the update won't happen. Sometimes it doesn't. But I WILL finish this. There WILL be an update, no matter how long it takes. Trust me.

Anyway, I thank you all for sticking this out with me. I was looking at when I published this the other day—August of 2007. It's taken me almost three years so far to write 50,000 words. For NaNoWriMo, I do that in a month. But, you know, I like looking back at chapter one. Can you see how much I have improved? It might not look like much to you, but it's phenomenal to me.

So, I just wanted to clarify that I will be finishing this. Don't give up on me, now! This chapter was pretty intense, right? You want to know more. I know you do. Oh, yeah!

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Thanks for sticking it out! More updates to come, I promise!


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